Guardian Fury
by ClanCrusher
Summary: Guardian Forces go into battle, use their attack, and thats it right? Wrong. Squall finds out the true secret of the GFs during a chance encounter, along with a new deadly threat.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy VIII or Square Enix so don't sue me. Please?

A/N: First fic alert! I had this idea banging inside my head for a while so I finally decided to put it down on paper. Tell me what you think. Oh and a little warning, I am going to bet that you never would have seen this coming.

Duck. Roll. Dodge. Swing. Retreat.

Squall backed away from the T-Rexaur to catch his breath, his Lion Heart gunblade in a defensive position. After catching his breath he charged at the monster again.

Jump. Swing. Trigger. Duck.

He jumped back to avoid another head butt. Running forward Squall jumped over the tail and jumped again to strike at the T-Rexaur's face. Timing his swings perfectly Squall unloaded the Renzokuken into the dinosaurs neck, killing it almost instantly.

Sensing another presence behind him Squall lifted up one hand and drew fire magic from the fading T-Rexaur. With the other hand he unloaded the fire magic into the Grats that were trying to sneak up behind him.

Sighing to himself he picked up the gunblade from where he dropped it and cleaned it on the grass. After carefully examining it he placed it in the sheath on his back and slowly walked out of the Balamb Garden training center.

It had been 6 months since Ultimecia's defeat and the end of the Time Compressed World and things had settled into a rut at Balamb Garden. Galbadia was quiet and Timber had stopped most of their revolutionary activities for the time being.

Even the most troublesome monsters had been quiet as of late, and lets face it, Squall was bored. It seemed that recently his job as a commander had him taking up pens and pencils as his weapons instead of his gunblade. He trained in the Training Center constantly to escape the monotonous lull of the daily life he was living but not even the mighty T-Rexaur seemed to be a challenge to him anymore.

He found himself jumping at almost every assignment he could, whether it was a field test or a rumor, just to find something interesting to do.

So lost in thought, he bumped straight into Zell, knocking him straight to the floor.

"Sorry Zell," he mumbled quietly.

"Owwww! Damn man, I felt like I just ran into a brick wall. Do you have the Brothers junctioned again?" he whined.

"No, just Shiva."

Zell picked himself off the ground and rubbed his forehead a little bit, "Oh yeah! Cid wanted to see you by the way. Said he had an important assignment for you."

Squall perked up a little at this, "Did he say anything about it?"

"He said to dress warmly."

Giving his thanks Squll headed towards the elevator. He met Seifer there in his white trench coat followed by Fujin and Raijin. He had come back to the Garden after Ultimecia's defeat and made a public apology for his actions. Cid had reinstated him as head of the disciplinary committee and he had joined 'Squalls crowd' as a good friend.

He still hadn't passed his Seed examine and he still fought dirty but Squall wouldn't have it any other way.

"Where you headed today Squall?" asked Seifer as he passed.

"Away from here." He said simply.

"That boring huh? I feel ya man. The boredom is so thick here you can cut with a gunblade."

"INDEED." Spoke Fujin.

"I'm heading down to Balamb to enter the card tournament." Explained Seifer.

"…You play cards?"

"Aint nothing else to do on this island." With a swish of his coat he and his friends walked towards the front gate. Squall took the elevator to the headmaster's office.

Cid greeted him from behind his desk, "Thank you for coming so quickly Squall."

"…Whatever."

Any normal commanding officer might have reprimanded Squall's attitude but Cid had been around him too long to be affected by it any longer.

"So how have you been lately? I heard that we needed to order a double shipment of monsters for the training center due to your activities in there."

Squall said nothing in his typical 'I could care less' manner.

"How have things been with your fath…"

"If you don't mind sir, I would like to know the reason why I was called up here." Said Squall cutting him off.

Cid sighed, "You were never one to beat around the bush. Very well here are the facts." Cid unrolled a world map on his desk. Squall noticed that there was a big red circle around the Shumi Village Island.

"There have been reports of an ice monster prowling around Shumi Village. The townsfolk of the area have requested Seed aid."

"So what does this have to do with me?"

"Ahem. I'm sorry, they did not request Seed aid, the village elder requested your aid specifically."

"Why?"

"He said that you were the only one that the people in his village trusted. I'm afraid that your going to have to go solo for this mission, if you accept that is."

Squall didn't even hesitate, "I'll go."

As he turned to leave Cid called out to him, "Oh, by the way, how have things been with Rinoa?"

"…Don't ask."

It wasn't until Squall was actually in the Ragnarock before he remembered that he didn't bother to junction any GF except Shiva. Not an ideal GF to use against an ice monster.

'Guess I'll just have to do this one myself,' thought Squall to himself.

Squall expertly navigated the skies towards Shumi village. It did help that there was no air traffic. As soon as he reached the island disaster struck. A blizzard came out of nowhere, completely covering the front window. He tried his best to regain control but the wind made maneuvering difficult.

Despite the difficulties he was able to make a pretty good landing.

Well…okay it was an OK landing, I mean, any landing that you can walk away from is a good landing right? Oh forget it. He crashed the damn thing right into a mountain and had to cast a cure spell on himself.

(Back to the story)

'Where the hell did that come from?' thought Squall as he headed towards the emergency exit. The front of the ship was buried in a mountain of snow and Squall assessed that there would be no way to move it until the blizzard passed. As soon as he hit the button that released the air lock he was assailed by a blast of cold wind.

Tightening his jacket around him Squall stepped out into a winter nightmare. The snow was coming down fast and hard and the wind was blowing right into his face. Again he wished that he had remembered the junction a better GF for the situation.

'No time to dwell on the past, better start roughing it.'

Progress was slow. It seemed the harder he tried to walk into the storm the more fiercely it blew at him. It was getting so bad that he could barely see his hand in front of his face. Fortunately there were no enemies. Not even they were stupid enough to go out in weather like this.

'Guess that makes me an idiot then.' Thought Squall to himself. He couldn't help but chuckle at his own words.

'Man, look at me. Near death and here I am laughing to myself.'

He had no idea where he was, and he had lost the Ragnarock a while ago.

'This is pointless. I could pass Shumi Village and not even know it.'

He didn't know how long he walked. Feeling was lost in his feet and hands and the meager jacket he had on was little better than nothing.

'When the headmaster said dress warmly I wasn't expecting dress for the ice age.'

And then, it stopped.

'The hell?'

Squall looked around. Directly behind him and directly in front of him he could see the storm raging around him. But not in this clearing.

'I must be in the eye of the storm. That's lucky.'

Feeling the hairs on the back of his neck raise Squall drew his gunblade. During the time he and his friends had went around the world and defeated Ultimecia he had honed his danger sense. He could usually tell when a monster approaching and it had saved his life on countless occasions.

Suddenly, the snow in front of him shot up like a geyser, knocking Squall back and throwing his gunblade from his hand. The snow died down and Squall looked upon the ice monster.

The thing looked a lot like the Abadon he had fought in Esthar's Great Salt Lake except this one was made of pure ice. The thing stood three times taller than him, its limbs a steely blue with two red eyes near the top of its head.

Right where its chest area should have been was a blue…something. It looked like a type of fog but it was colored a lighter blue from the rest of the monster.

The thing reared back its head and let out a roar that chilled Squall's very bones. Finally it looked directly at Squall and opened its mouth, letting out a barrage of icicles, each one as thick as Edea's special.

Cursing to himself Squall dove to the side, narrowly avoiding the icicles and retrieving his Lion Heart. The thing pounded the ground sending a shockwave through the snow, knocking Squall on his back.

Picking himself off the ground he had just enough time to roll out of the way of another volley of ice. Moving back to get some room he used scan.

Briefly his eyes filled with 1's and 0's of computer information.

Monster Data- ?

'Fat lot of help that did.'

The thing had stopped firing off icicles and was moving towards him again. Squall readied a Firaga spell he had gotten from the T-Rexaur earlier that day.

Running forward and jumping over the shockwave the thing produced he shot the spell right at the monsters leg. Aside from slightly melting the ice the spell did nothing.

The monster however, seemed to be in pain. It let out another roar and brought down its fist where Squall was standing. Squall managed to avoid a direct hit but the resulting shockwave knocked him back several yards. He was able to hold on to his weapon though.

Getting up once again Squall faced the monster only to find that a flurry of icicles was coming at him. Not having time to dodge squall tried to deflect them. He was able to get most of them but a few of them got through his guard. One went directly through his leg.

Biting back a yell Squall gripped the icicle and pulled it out of his leg. Furious, he threw the thing back at the monster. Surprisingly it scored a direct hit right in the midsection where the strange mist was. There were now several fine cracks running along the ice that encased it. The monster let out another roar and jerked the icicle out of its chest.

"Don't like that do you?" Squall told the monster. Forcing himself to ignore the pain in his leg Squall ran towards the monster again. He ducked under some icicles and jumped over another shockwave. As the monster brought its fist down again Squall jumped on it.

The thing brought its fist up in the air, preparing to fling Squall off but before it could jerk its fist he jumped off the limb, straight for its midsection.

"Rough Dive!" he shouted out just before striking the chest of the monster, shattering the ice around the mist. The mist immediately seeped out and the monster fell to pieces, dropping Squall onto the ground.

He lay there for a few seconds with his eyes closed. The storm had died with the creature and the wound in his leg, aggravated by his final actions, was making him feel lightheaded.

'Oh well,' he thought to himself, 'At least I took that bastard with me.'

Opening his eyes he saw that the mist was still floating in the air above him. Before he could say anything he felt a pulling inside his chest. With a mighty tug that almost made him scream a blue ball of light shot out of his chest and collided with the mist.

Staggering to his knees Squall witnessed a small tornado in the air where the two things met.

He nearly fell over when he heard a woman's voice shout out:

"FREE AT LAST!"

The tornado finally died down and Squall got a look at the speaker.

There were not many things that could shock squall. However this nearly made him faint.

"S…s…Shiva!"

There in front of him stood the GF Shiva in all her icy glory. There was something different about her though. A smile was on her lips instead of the usual cold expression she was wearing when she was called into battle. Squall had never heard her talk, or make any noise for that matter but now she was speaking to him plain as day.

She looked directly at Squall, "Hello Squall. Yes, I am Shiva. It is nice to finally meet you."

"Bu…but your still junctioned to me! How can you be talking to me?"

"No Squall. I am the true Shiva.

Squall didn't respond. Passing out can do that to a guy.

A/N: Your probably going to be breaking your arms holding on to this cliffhanger. Please leave a review and tell me what you think.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Yawn.

A/N: I must be doing something right since I got some pretty good reviews.

She looked directly at Squall, "Hello Squall. Yes, I am Shiva. It is nice to finally meet you."

"Bu…but your still junctioned to me! How can you be talking to me?"

"No Squall. I am the true Shiva.

Squall didn't respond. Passing out can do that to a guy.

Guardian Fury Presents 

**Chapter 2: Shiva's Awakening**

Squall knew he was dreaming. Being set so hard in reality for so long gave him a keen sense of when he was awake or not and he knew that he was not awake.

In his dream he saw Rinoa in her usual outfit with her pinwheel. She was in a field of flowers playing with her dog Angelo, throwing a plastic disc and watching him catch it.

'Rinoa,' Squall thought sadly to himself. He thought he loved her once, he probably still did but he doubted Rinoa's feelings. She had probably been the first person who had openly cared for him and he had opened her heart to her and dropped his defenses just for her.

He realized now that she had been caught on the rebound. She had been so desperate for companionship, for someone to remind her of Seifer, that after he had supposedly been executed, she had come on to Squall. Squall, so desperate for companionship never questioned her actions but accepted her.

Now that Seifer was back, things had become a little rock between them. Squall, never one to force someone into anything had pretty much let her go in heart and mind. He shuddered as the flowery landscape around him turned to winter and a light snow started falling.

The snow fell harder and faster, he lost sight of Rinoa and her dog in the flurry of flakes. The cold began to creep up on him even as he gathered his coat around him. The temperature kept falling, threatening to freeze him to death but he felt oddly comforted.

'Wait a minute,' he thought to himself, 'I don't have to deal with this!'

With a grunt of effort and force of mind he forced himself to wake up to the world of the living.

A few minutes earlier:

Shiva watched as Squall passed out. The blood loss he had suffered from the near penetration of his leg, combined with his afterward actions was taking its toll.

Acting quickly she rummaged through Squall's discarded pack, finally finding a med kit. Removing some bandages she summoned her power to numb his wound before wrapping the gauze around his leg.

The blizzard was starting again. Although she liked the cold she knew that Squall was not immune to it as she was. She had to find a cave quickly, for the blizzard was set to last all day and a good part of the night.

Over the years of being imprisoned within that ice monster she had a ridiculous amount of energy that needed to be bled off one way or another, and it was in the form of this blizzard.

Picking up Squall in a fireman's carry she quickly glided across the snowy landscape, using the howling winds behind her to boost her speed. Luck was with her as she quickly located a fair sized cave that contained room enough for the both of them.

Taking a look at her patient she saw that his breathing had regulated. She felt his pulse and wasn't really surprised to find that he was nearly back to normal.

'After all,' she thought, 'He survived an ice spear to the chest what should I expect?'

Muttering a few words under her breath she scanned Squall with her 'chi sight.' A fancy little trick that all of the Guardians knew that let them examine the life force of a living entity.

Seeing that he was now dreaming she sat up against the opposite wall and waited for Squall to awake.

Squall opened his eyes to see Shiva looking at him from across the cave. He took stock of his body and found that he couldn't move his leg. Looking down he saw that his leg was entombed in an icy cast so that his leg wound could heal easily while deadening the pain. It also stopped his leg from moving.

"Don't even try it Squall," Shiva said suddenly, startling Squall, "You're not going anywhere until this storm is over."

'The hell?' he thought, 'How did she know what I was thinking?'

"Come off it Squall. I've been with you ever since you entered the fire cavern. I doubt there is another person on Hyne that knows you as well as I do."

'True enough.' He thought to himself. He had always been junctioned to Shiva no matter where he was. His friends told him that the GF suited him saying that they both had a cold attitude.

"So…Shiva. Do you mind explaining what's going on?"

"About what?" she asked innocently.

"Like what the hell that ice monster was and why the hell you're still out here even though you're still junctioned to me!" he shouted. He always hated it when there were things that he couldn't understand or he was kept in the dark.

Shiva didn't even seem fazed by the outburst, "Squall if you keep trying to get up then I will freeze your whole body to that stone right there. I know you hate being kept in the dark so let me explain."

'Damnit!' Squall thought but relaxed himself anyways.

She unfurled from her sitting position and moved around a bit to get comfortable. For the first time Squall was actually able to get a good look at her. Before, when she had been summoned in battle, Squall had never really been able to examine her as he had always been distracted by the battle.

Now that she was sitting across from him he finally got an eyeful of her perfect figure and state of near undress, covered only by the swimsuit like apparel that fit her body perfectly…

Squall mentally started hitting himself, 'Do not think about that Squall!' he mentally chided to himself. He almost felt himself blush but was able to hold it back.

Shiva gave him a small mischievous smirk before finally seating herself on one of the rocks.

"Let's see, the story begins around, oh say 5,000+ years ago," She began.

"This is going to take a while isn't it?" mumbled Squall.

"Yes. Now be quiet. Long ago the ultimate force created everything and everyone in it. He created the animals, the people, and the world itself. Along with those things, the ultimate force created the Guardians, or as you like to call them, GF's."

"Each Guardian was given his, or her, unique ability and area of control. He created a total of 32 guardians, among them Ifrit, Quezacotl, Siren, and me. I was given control over the element of ice while Ifrit was given the power of fire. Quezacotl was given the power over thunder while the Siren was given the power over light. The point is that every GF had their specialty."

Squall interrupted, "32? But we only have 16 GFs that were cataloged in the history texts."

"Of course. Those 16, and some others are the only ones remaining."

"Remaining? But I thought it was impossible to kill of a Guardian!" exclaimed Squall.

"Normally yes. Now let me finish."

Squall sighed and readjusted his position into a more comfortable one.

"There is a saying that goes 'For every source of light there must be an equal source of darkness,' well the darkness eventually did come. It came in the form of Ultimecia. Using her power she began to corrupt the Guardians and turn them to her side. You might remember some of them when you went to fight Ultimecia such as Tiamat and Krysta."

"You mean all those monsters were GFs?"

"Some of the minor ones. When you defeated them their essence was scattered and they probably wont be appearing for a long time. The major ones such as Ifrit and I were dealt with more forcefully."

"What happened?" asked Squall in a surprisingly worried voice.

"To put it bluntly she ripped our spirit from our bodies and imprisoned them in various locations, usually guarded by powerful monsters. Over time the remaining shell of the GFs body began to take form again but it lacked the true power of the Guardian.

Shiva shuddered as if recalling a painful memory, "The powerful Guardians were stripped of all human traits and emotions except the most primal instincts of combat such as destroying their enemies and submitting to ones more powerful then them. This was how the first of the Guardians were enslaved by the humans."

For some reason Squall was feeling extremely guilty. He and his friends had beaten more than one guardian into submission.

Shiva sensing his discomfort walked over and lightly punched him on the arm, "Hey cheer up! I don't blame you in the slightest. You were the one that helped free my spirit from its prison after all."

Squall spoke up, "So now that we defeated Ultimecia everything should return to normal right?"

Shiva sat down next to him, "Not quite. There are still some minor problems. Every guardian that you know of is still imprisoned and guarded."

"So all we have to do is release them from their prisons and everything will be fine right?"

"That brings us to the second problem. Ultimecia wasn't the one behind all of this."

This shocked Squall to the very core. He could already feel the peace they had worked so hard to obtain slip away. In a voice that was cold as hard steel he asked Shiva, "Who is it?"

Grim faced Shiva replied, "No one knows his real name. The name he goes by now is Omega Weapon."

Balamb Garden:

Newly reinstated Instructor Quistis approached the elevator door to head to Cid's office. It had been 2 days since anyone had seen or heard from Squall and the garden was walking on eggshells when the news of their commander had leaked out.

From what Quisits had heard, Cid had sent Squall on a solo mission somewhere to help him relive some of his tension. She, along with a lot of other people, had seen the pent up energy Squall had and many had agreed that Squall needed a vacation.

Cid, knowing that Squall would never accept time off, sent him out on a low risk mission going solo, but he had not returned.

Pushing the button repeatedly in the hope that the elevator might go faster, Quistis rode the machine to the office.

When the door finally opened she saw a grim faced headmaster seated behind his desk. He was focusing intently on a small computer monitor, seeming to ignore the world around him.

"Headmaster…" Quistis began but she was cut off.

"In a second Ms. Trepe. I think that all of Squalls friends should be here to listen to this."

Over the PA system a loud message rang through the halls, "Rinoa Heartilly, Zell Dincht, Selphie Tilmitt, and Irvine Kinneas, please report to the headmasters office. It concerns commander Leonhart.

Rinoa Heartilly stopped looking at the copy of Squall's ring and placed it on her nightstand before running out of the room.

For the first time in the history of Balamb Garden, Zell Dincht left a hot dog half uneaten and ran to the elevator.

Selphie Tilmitt abandoned her hold on the ladder supporting one of the more unfortunate Garden Festival Workers to run out of the Quad.

Irvine Kinneas stopped in mid sentence as he was hitting on the Library Girl and walked away with a hasty goodbye.

A few minutes later:

The friends gathered in the headmaster's office awaiting the words of Headmaster Cid.

"As you may or may not have known, Squall was sent on a low-risk solo assignment as a sort of semi-vacation."

A few of the people present nodded.

Waving a hand to Xu a holographic screen popped up, showing a world map.

"Squall was assigned to rid Shumi Village of an Ice Monster that they claimed had been plaguing their lands. The sources were unreliable and were thus written off as hallucinations and the like."

Zell raised his hand, "Excuse me sir but to be quite frank, shouldn't you have know better?"

If Cid was offended by Zell's words he didn't show it, "That's the beauty of hindsight Zell. We all have perfect 20/20 vision."

A red line began to appear on the map.

"The Ragnarock was implemented with a tracking device recently so we could track its progress in the even that it was lost or stolen. This is Squall's path."

The red line made a beeline for Shumi Village for the most part. As it neared its destination the line became erratic and shaky before finally disappearing all together.

"We lost the signal around this area. Citizens from Trabia Garden have reported a large blizzard appeared and engulfed a large part of the island. As of now, we do not know what has happened to Squall."

Selphie piped up, "So what are we going to do about it?"

Cid sighed, "We can't do anything about it."

This time Irvine spoke up, "But we do have the floating garden! Couldn't we use that to…"

Cid interrupted him, "Irvine, the Ragnarock crashed in that storm. What makes you think that the garden will be any different?"

Irvine was silent.

Rinoa was the last to speak up, "Cant we do something?"

Quistis was the one who responded. In a defeated voice she said, "All we can do it ride the storm out and pray for Squall's safety."

A/N: Another chapter up and running, hope you enjoy it. Thank you to the three people that reviewed my story.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: I don't own Pokemon. Whoops, wrong story.

A/N: After weeks of waiting I am finally getting the next chapter out. My thanks to everyone who reviewed.

Rinoa was the last to speak up, "Cant we do something?"

Quistis was the one who responded. In a defeated voice she said, "All we can do it ride the storm out and pray for Squall's safety."

Somewhere near Shumi Village:

Squall looked outside the cave entrance. After two days of waiting and healing, the storm was dying down, along with the pain in his leg. He had always been a fast healer after all and the injury had been relatively minor compared to some of the others he had gotten on his adventures.

He looked upon the sleeping form of Shiva and thought back to their conversation last night.

'Just when I thought it was over something new comes up to threaten the world again.' Thought Squall bitterly, 'Oh well, maybe I wont be so bored now.'

Squall couldn't help but chuckle to himself, 'I must be going crazy. My life is on the line, the world is in danger and here I am laughing to myself, again.'

FLASHBACK

"So all we have to do is kill Omega Weapon right?" inquired Squall.

Shiva sighed, "I wish it were that simple."

Squall looked at her, "So what's stopping us?"

"Frankly put? If you take on Omega Weapon right now, you'll loose, no questions asked."

"What if I got my friends to help?" asked Squall.

"You mean the guys that saved the world last time? I'm sorry but their combined strength, even with their GF's, would be about the equivalent of shooting a BB gun at a freight train."

Squall was silent, "So what can we do?"

"Simple. I want you to help me free the other GF's from their prisons."

"Why do you need my help?"

"Several reasons, few of which you want to know, and even less that you would understand."

'God damn mysteries,' thought Squall angrily, 'Oh hell what do I have to loose?'

"…Alright I'll do it."

Shiva enveloped him in a surprisingly warm hug, making him stiffen in surprise, "Thanks Squall."

END FLASHBACK

Shiva kept her eyes closed as she sensed around for Squall. He was by the cave entrance, staring out at the snow-covered ground. She too thought about the conversation last night.

When Squall had said that he still had her junctioned to him he was correct, but there were some things she had not told him. Ever since her spirit had been set free the junction began to work two ways. It wasn't even considered a junction now, more of a link.

The end result was a type of bond that connected them to eachother. If one of the people involved concentrated hard enough, he or she could sense where the other was and what they were feeling.

However Shiva had gotten the feeling that if Squall had found out about the connection he would sever it, rending her helpless. While it was true most of her power were recovered when her spirit was set free there was still something missing, an anchor. Unfortunately she couldn't pinpoint where, or what, it was.

Until then she had to use Squall as her anchor to this world. This was also why she needed him to come along.

'Of course I have my own 'personal' reasons…' she thought quietly to herself.

Squall watched as Shiva awoke from her sleep, only to quickly look away as her stretching threatened to degrade his thoughts into NC-17.

'Damnit,' he thought angrily, 'Why the hell am I reacting like this?'

Shiva felt a stab of frustration come from Squall. Concentrating for a bit she searched very deep into his emotions, past the self imposed barriers of ice, and smiled at what she found, 'He's probably not used to feeling that…particular emotion.'

Speaking to Shiva without turning Squall spoke, "I need to get back to the ship and report. If I'm gone for four days I'll be MIA and I don't need to deal with that.

Starting to walk away, he was abruptly stopped as he found he couldn't move his bad leg.

"And just how do you think your going to get anywhere with that bandage on?" asked Shiva smugly as she shattered the ice that had trapped Squall's foot.

"It's nothing," muttered Squall as he tried to walk again.

"Really?" reaching out, Shiva gently poked Squall's leg in the place where the ice spear had penetrated. Squall nearly toppled over from the pain that shot up his leg and throughout his body.

"Don't try to act macho Squall," chided the ice queen, "You don't need to show off to anyone."

Squall felt another stab of annoyance at her words but conceded to let her support him.

The landscape, so unlike yesterday's blizzard, gave a calm and serene feeling. The sun was shining on the newly fallen snow that had slowed down to a mere sprinkle. There were no footprints anywhere; even the monsters had not come out yet.

"So, Shiva?"

"Hmm?"

"Who are we going to free first?"

"The only guardian I can sense right now is the Siren, and that's only because she's my cousin."

"Your cousin." Squall said incredulously.

"I know, and I've been trying to hide it for so long." She said wistfully.

"What's wrong with her?"

"Well, let's just say that she's not all…up there. If you know what I mean." She finished.

Squall knew exactly what she meant. He had encountered those kinds of people several times. His face almost broke into a full out grin when he remembered a particular pair…

FLASHBACK

"You're not getting away this time!" shouted Wedge.

"Yeah! We'll stop you!" added Biggs.

Squall acted immediately and casted confuse on Wedge. The officer staggered for a few seconds before attacking Biggs.

"Hey! What the hell was that for?"

Biggs retaliated and punched Wedge in the stomach, knocking him out of his confusion.

"Damnit Biggs! That hurt!" and Wedge retaliated with a punch to the face.

"Why you…"

The two rolled on the ground, weapons forgotten, punching and kicking eachother. Squall and his friends merely walked by, ignoring the two soldiers.

END FLASHBACK

"Yeah, I know exactly what you mean."

Due to the injury Squall had received the progress was slow but steady. The temperature was cool but not to the point of freezing. Squall had a suspicion that Shiva had something to do with it.

They finally reached the Ragnarock after a good 2 hours of walking. Squall stifled the urge to yell in frustration as he saw that ship was buried under a mound of snow so large that only the tail end was visible.

"So how are we going to get this thing out?" asked Squall, "Can you use your powers to move the snow away?"

Shiva shook her head, "Sorry, my powers only let me create ice, not remove it."

"Guess we'll just have to do this the hard way then." Said Squall with a grimace.

Concentrating on his gunblade, Squall junctioned the fire magic he had into the blade. Estimating where the air lock on the ship was Squall leaped into the air and performed a dive straight into the snow. The fire magic combined with the force of his attack easily made a hole straight through the snow and right to the airlock.

Unfortunately his leg wound combined with the stress the attack put on his leg made Squall fall over in agony.

Shiva jumped down the hole and landed gently next to Squall's prone figure.

She grabbed Squall by his jacket and easily pulled him to his feet, "Probably not the best solution but it worked. And if you try to play hero again make sure that your fully healed."

They made their way through the ship and towards the cockpit. The Ragnarock was a mess. Many things were lying broken on the floor and there were several cracks running along the hull.

"Assuming that this thing can actually get off the ground," said Squall, "I'd give us about 2 hours flight time before the thing crashes."

"Any place we can repair it?" asked Shiva.

Squall thought for a minute, 'I don't think Zell could restore this flying death trap from the states it in so that only leaves one place…'

"…We'll have to go to Esthar."

Shiva felt his words bare a trace of distaste though he hid it well. She decided not to press him for details.

Flipping the necessary switches Squall started up the Ragnarock, the whole ship seeming to groan in protest at the action. Trying to ignore the feeling of dread that was creeping up on him Squall hit the engine boost button and held it down.

The ship shook under them, straining to get free of its snowy prison. After 10 seconds of struggling the snow began to melt and the Ragnarock shot off like a bullet.

"SQUALL! WATCH WHERE YOU'RE DRIVING"

The driver immediately turned the ship sideways almost causing Shiva to fall over had she not grabbed onto Squall's seat. The Ragnarock missed the mountain range directly in front of them by mere inches.

"PULL UP SQUALL!"

"I'M TRYING!"

Squall jerked the ship to the right, barely skimming another mountain range.

"GET YOUR HAND OFF THE BOOST BUTTON!"

"I CAN'T! IT'S STUCK!"

They were zipping through the mountain ranges, the Ragnarock a blur. The boost button had gotten stuck in the down position so the engines were on full throttle. Squall was jerking the steering wheel left and right trying to avoid the mountains.

He was trying to pull up but the steering functions had also been jammed, making it almost impossible to move upwards.

Both of them breathed a sigh of relief as they entered a bare plain except for one object…

"Hey Squall, what is that place?"

"That's…TRABIA GARDEN!"

Cid's Office:

Cid looked over the people gathered in his office. All of Squall's friends including Seifer were there.

"Everyone, I have good news and bad news. The good news is that the storm has finally died down."

"So we can go and get Squall right?" asked Selphie eagerly.

"Well… that brings us to the second part. The bad news is the Ragnarock has also been found. Heading straight towards Trabia Garden. They contacted us when they saw the ship."

"What's so bad about that?" asked Quistis.

"You misunderstand me. The Ragnarock is going full power towards Trabia Garden without any indication of stopping."

"Is the communicator back online?" asked Selphie suddenly.

"Yes I believe it is." Selphie's image suddenly disappeared and reappeared by the communications device.

"Squall? Squall? Can you hear me?"

All of a sudden a feminine voice came over the communicator.

"We're sorry, your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please hand up and try again."

Selphie brought out her Nunchaku and hit the machine several times, finally getting an answer.

"Squall can you hear me?"

A masculine voice answered this time, "What?"

Selphie fiddled with some dials, "Can you hear me now?"

"I can't hear what your saying!" the voice shouted back.

Making a few more adjustments Selphie tried again, "Can you hear me now?"

"Yes."

"Good. Now what the hell are you doing?" she shouted, "We just rebuilt that place don't wreck it again!"

There was some fumbling and a female voice came over the system, "Look, I'm really sorry but we're gonna have to cut this short. Were trying not to get killed at the moment, so we gotta go."

The communicator went dead.

Everyone in the room was silent for a few seconds, "Who was that?" asked Rinoa.

No one had an answer for her.

A/N: Short chapter with not much happening but it's the holidays so cut me some slack. In the next chapter we find out if Squall and Shiva survive (stupid question really) their ride and Squall confronts his father.

Please drop a review on the way out to tell me what you think.

Cheers.


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: I know disclaimers get on everybody's nerves, everybody's nerves, everybody's nerves. I know disclaimers get on everybody's nerves and this is how it goes! I know dis…**SMASH!**

Squall: Will you shut up? 

A/N: Ahem. Well anyway, now that I have had sufficient time to recharge my brain, I introduce to you the next chapter of Guardian Fury.

There was some fumbling and a female voice came over the system, "Look, I'm really sorry but we're gonna have to cut this short. Were trying not to get killed at the moment, so we gotta go."

The communicator went dead.

Everyone in the room was silent for a few seconds, "Who was that?" asked Rinoa.

No one had an answer for her.

Shiva and Squall were still struggling with the steering wheel as they rocketed towards Trabia Garden.

All of a sudden a loud snap was heard and the steering column snapped off and sent Shiva and Squall tumbling to the ground with the ice queen on top of him, holding the remains of the steering shaft.

Fortunately in their last ditch effort the machine had angled slightly upwards, just barely skimming the top of the garden.

"Well," spoke Squall as if he was talking about the weather, "That wasn't so bad now was it?"

Shiva instantly went from a prone position to one where the had her hands around Squall's neck, "WASN'T SO BAD? YOU NEARLY GOT US KILLED!"

"It's…cough…part of…cough…the job!" he protested.

The ice queen stopped strangling Squall but her hands didn't leave his neck, "You job is to STAY ALIVE! That means the opposite of death!"

"Hey, you were with me on my adventures so why are you so freaked out? This kind of stuff happens all the time."

Shiva calmed a bit, "Well, your right. I guess I'm just not used to a front row seat of the action."

It was then that the two finally noticed their position. Shiva was straddling a prone Squall with her hands around his neck in a very suggestive position.

Squall looked up at Shiva who shrugged and replied nonchalantly, "As much as I enjoy our position I think we should keep our mind on the task at hand."

The Seed commander had to work very hard to keep from blushing as Shiva got up and got back into the co-pilots seat. Squall limped over and sat back down in the pilots seat. Picking up the communicator he contacted the garden.

"Headmaster Cid, this is Squall Leonheart calling in. Do you read me?"

Some static then a reply, "This is headmaster cid, you're on speaker. Mind telling me what the hell you're doing?

"Trying to stay alive sir. The Ragnarock controls are malfunctioning."

"I'll send in a call to Esthar to let them know of your status. They're the only ones that can do a midair rescue."

A loud beeping sound alerted Squall to the dash again. This time the fuel light was blinking. There was silence on the other end for a while, then…

"Do I even want to know what that was?" asked Cid sarcastically.

Squall leaned forward and banged his head on the dash not really caring about anything at the moment, "No sir, not really."

"Just make sure you hit the water instead of a city. Good luck. Over and out."

Tired and waterlogged Shiva and Squall came ashore near the town of Dollet.

"Well, that wasn't so bad was it?" asked Shiva.

"…"

"I mean any landing you can walk away from is a good one right?"

"…."

"At least you didn't hit Dollet."

"….."

"Your still alive right?"

"………………"

The Ragnarock was totaled. Anyone who looked at it would not recognize it as an airship anymore, rather a scrap pile. Since the controls had been destroyed they were unable to control their decent and ended up crashing on the beach instead of in the water. The ship had continued right into the mountains after skidding for several yards along the ground.

Bottom line, the thing was a metal graveyard.

Amazingly they had both gotten off real light. Squall and Shiva had the sense to move to the back of the ship and jump out of the airlock before the thing actually crashed into the mountains.

"Are you okay Squall?"

Wincing in pain Squall answered, "I've…had better days."

Let's just say that the fall was not kind to Squall's injuries.

"Shiva, you know as soon as we get to Dollet there's going to be a crowd of people wanting to know what's going on."

"So? What's your point?"

"If we want to keep this mission under wraps you cant go in looking like that."

Shiva looked down at herself and nodded, "Hmm, I guess blue skin does manage to stand out in a crowd."

Shiva concentrated for a few seconds and then disappeared completely.

"What the-"

Squall can you hear me? The voice had come from inside his head.

"Shiva? Where are you?"

I'm in the place GF's go when your not using them. 

"That's good. I don't feel like explaining things just yet."

Try thinking to me instead of talking, unless you want people thinking that you're talking to yourself. 

Squall focused his thoughts Like this? 

Perfect 

Making slower progress than before, Squall limped the rest of the way to Dollet where he was met by half the town guard and the mayor.

"Is that your ship?"

Being supported by two guards Squall nodded.

The mayor addressed the guards, "Get this man some medical attention. Questions later."

Squall vaguely remembered being half-carried to a medical ward and lying down on a bed. He did, however, vividly remember the dream he had that night, if you could call it that.

Squall opened his eyes but he still saw darkness. He could feel and see his body but his surroundings were blank.

'Where am I?'

"Your in a subspace pocket where the GF's live when not being used." Came a reply.

Looking behind him Squall saw Shiva standing a short distance away from him.

"Why's it all dark?"

"Because this is your mind. If you think of something, then it will happen. For instance, you already pictured yourself in your clothes so you're already wearing them."

Squall looked at himself and realized Shiva was right. Experimenting, Squall pictured his Gunblade, and instantly it appeared by his side. Nodding in satisfaction he banished it back to wherever it came from.

Looking again at the darkness surrounding him Squall pictured a room with two comfortable chairs and a couple couches with a fireplace. He had seen it in a magazine once. Suddenly, the room appeared.

"Ahh…much better. You have no idea how dull darkness it." Shiva sat down on one of the chairs and motioned Squall to sit on the other one.

Squall didn't beat around the bush, "So what is it?"

Shiva sighed, "Straight to the point as always. You really need to learn to relax a little bit."

"I take my missions seriously."

"Yeah well your going to be on this mission for a long time so take it easy. I'm surprised that expression hasn't locked on your face."

Squall twitched.

"Anyway, what I wanted to talk to you about was that I'm sensing the Siren guardian around this area."

"Do you know where she is?"

"In Dollet." She said simply.

Noticing Squalls incredulous look she amended, "I can't get an exact fix on her location, however it is likely that her soul is also being guarded by a monster."

"There's only one place where monsters would be in Dolett, and that's the communication tower."

Shiva nodded, "Then we'll head there once you wake up," Squall turned to leave but he was stopped by a hand on his shoulder, "Oh and Squall?"

Squall looked over his shoulder.

"Cheer up. There's more to life than work. Live a little." Saying this she leaned over and kissed him on the cheek before disappearing.

Not much can surprise Squall Leonheart. When he learned of Ultimecia he barely batted an eyelash. Even when Seifer had gate crashed the presidents speech at Timber he had hardly been surprised at all.

This however, left him standing stock still for about 2 minutes before he finally regained conscious thought. Even after he thought about it, he was still confused.

'The bottom of the sea is easier to fathom than the mind of a woman,' Squall thought to himself, 'I need some sleep,' tuning out his surroundings Squall drifted off to sleep.

Squall, wake up. 

No response.

Blink if you can hear me. 

Squall turned over in his sleep.

WAKE UP SQUALL! 

In a fluid motion Squall jumped out of bed and grabbed his gunblade, scaring the hell out of a nurse who was bringing him breakfast, causing her to drop the tray, causing a doctor walking in the opposite direction to slip on the mess and fall down a staircase, scaring an old guy out of his wits, which caused him to have a seizure.

Oops. 

Even though Squall couldn't see Shiva, he could almost imagine her sheepish look.

With a thought that somehow was able to project Squall's icy cold demeanor, he thought back, Don't do that again. 

An hour later found Squall in the office building of the mayor.

"Well glad to see you healed up nicely," he said cheerfully, "Drink?"

Squall shook his head.

"Very well then. Now I feel that we must address the situation of your illegally crashed aircraft. You are a Seed are you not?"

The man spoke elegantly and formally like a person of high rank normally would. He was a nondescript type of person who fit into the perfect stereotype of a mayor.

"Yes." Squall answered.

"Well then, I don't see too much of a problem with the accident as long as the Garden is willing to remove the wreckage. I am inclined not to press charges due to the help your garden provided in that nasty business with the communication tower."

"Thank you sir."

"Now that that's out of the way, were you planning on leaving or did you have some other business here?"

Don't tell him about your mission here. If too many people know then Omega weapon might start his attack before we're ready. 

Squall chose his words carefully, "I have…business that I need to attend to here."

The mayor nodded in understanding, "One of those top secret mission eh? I understand. Although I must warn you, the communications tower is still under the control of Galbadia and they don't react kindly to intruders."

Outside of the office:

So why cant we tell anyone about this? I understand the need for secrecy but surely a few people knowing wouldn't hurt. questioned Squall.

Maybe. Maybe not. Omega weapon was the one who sealed us all away in the first place. Every time we destroy one of his monsters and free a GF he will feel the connection being broken. 

Then why hasn't he found me and killed me yet? 

To put it plainly, you're small. Insignificant. But you're powerful enough to defeat his monsters. That's why you're the only one suited for this job. If more people gain awareness then we will be easier to track. 

Although he didn't like being called insignificant, Squall had to admit Shiva had a point. Compared to the GF's his power was relatively small. They walked in silence for a minute before Squall thought of something else.

Hey Shiva, any idea on how to get past the guard? 

Not really. 

The finally approached the town square where Seifer and the party had decided to disobey orders to go to the communications tower. As usual, the guard was standing there, denying access to anyone who approached.

"I'm sorry sir, I'm afraid I cant let you pass."

'The heck? Something about that voice sounds familiar'

"Hey wait a sec… I recognize you!"

Then it clicked, "Wedge? Is that you?"

"S…s…Squall?" the voice was shaky.

"Long time no see. Last time we met you were beating the crap out of your CO."

Squall swore he could see steam rising off of the man's helmet.

"I was demoted to guard duty because of you! You're the reason I'm standing here day in and day out guarding this stupid path! DIE!"

The shout was all the warning Squall needed to sidestep the sword swing. He then casually drew his gunblade and blocked the swing to his back.

"Chill out man. I just want to go to the communication tower."

"Oh so now you're trying to ruin me again by getting by me! Well not this time!"

He hadn't sensed any magic go off but he was sure that someone had cast a berserk spell on him. His attacks were full of power but had little accuracy to them and Squall easily batted them aside.

He doesn't seem to like you very much. thought Shiva conversationally.

Meh. I've seen worse. 

Thinking that he had toyed with him enough Squall ended the fight with a swift punch to the jaw, knocking him out instantly.

Well, that solves that problem. said Squall as he walked unhindered down the path to the tower.

Concentrating for a moment Squall summoned Shiva from subspace.

"So, what do we do now?"

In response Shiva summoned a spear of ice much like the one Edea had impaled with him and threw it in such a way that it passed within an inch of Squall's unmoving head.

Squall slowly turned around to see an Anacondaur impaled by the icicle.

"Take out your weapon, the cavalry has arrived."

A/N: A little late, even for my standards. Hope you liked the chapter. Thanks to everyone who reviewed and please continue to do so.


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: I don't abandon fics. I never abandon fics. I give them my utmost concentration until they are…hey what's that over there?

Without further ado, Guardian Fury, Chapter 5

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Squall had never really abused the power of the Guardian Forces. In his day-to-day fights, he had relied mostly on his gunblade skills, to keep his fighting skills sharp. After all, if he were ever in a position where he couldn't use his GF's, he wouldn't want to be helpless. After all, with the way things were going it didn't look like he was going to keep them forever.

Besides, using the GF's on anything short of heavy machinery and demons was like a crutch, or the very least overkill. There was still a blackened crater outside of Balamb garden from the first time he summoned Ifrit after his trials at the fire cavern. In retrospect, it reminded him of the analogy "hunting a fly with a shotgun."

Not to mention people complained about the damage. And insurance companies were a pain in the ass to deal with. You destroy one city and they get on your case for life. Sheesh…

The simple fact was however, that Shiva simply had no sense of the word control. Her power was spectacular but her moves were easy to predict. Not to mention wasteful in terms of energy.

Squall put a hand to his head in exasperation as Shiva destroyed another monster with her signature 'Diamond Dust' attack. Several hundred shards of ice pierced the snake like creature, continuing on through him and into the rocks.

"Shiva? Have you ever heard of restraint? Or overkill for that matter?"

Shiva looked at him in confusion.

"I'm talking about your fighting style," he explained, "It's a colossal waste of energy, not to mention a public hazard."

"What are you talking about? No one's around here and I've only used a little of my power reserves."

Squall sighed and stared off into the sunset, as if reminiscing about something long ago, "My adventure started out simple. Become a Seed and work with the garden as a mercenary for hire. Then I was drawn into this long and tiring adventure going through cave, and dungeon, and castle alike."

Turning around, Squall began to walk up the path with Shiva following behind him, "There will come a time, when you start on any grand quest, where you will need every resource and piece of energy available to you. And when that time comes, you'll be glad you saved your strength."

"…Did anyone ever tell you your really pessimistic?" asked Shiva.

"No. They just think it loudly."

"Ever try looking at the bright side of things?"

"What bright side?" asked Squall sarcastically.

"Seriously though. We're just going up the mountain. What's the worst that could happen?"

A loud boom and a small rumbling sound was her answer. Looking up at the cliffs she saw some rocks fly loose and tumble down the steep slope of the mountainside. The rumbling sound died down for a few seconds before it suddenly got louder. Then the ground started shaking.

Squall put his hand to his head in exasperation. Shiva had just broken the #1 rule of adventuring. Never ever ever ever ever **_ever_** say anything along the lines of "Can this get any worse?" Because it always will.

**CRASH!**

Squall winced as a particularly large stone broke off from the mountain and fell on to the communications tower, now in view. The base gone, the tower came crashing down on the cliff face. There was an amazing light show display before the tower exploded in flames, like a beacon around the countryside.

"Does that answer your question?" he asked sourly. Shiva didn't answer.

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Wedge shook his head and tried to clear the haze his bout with Squall had induced, 'God damnit,' he thought angrily, 'At this rate, I'll be demoted to janitor if Squall keeps screwing up my life like this.' He was the only guard stationed there, so if things went wrong, he'd take the blame.

Slowly he got to his feet and resumed his guard post. He decided to put the incident with Squall out of his head. After all, as long as no one from headquarters heard about the news, it would be ok right?

**BOOM!**

The shockwave sent him stumbling forward into the nearby fountain. Fortunately, he was able to regain his balance before falling in. 

'Please god,' he prayed silently to himself, 'Please don't let that be what I think it is.'

Turning around, Wedge saw the communications tower in flames.

Letting out an anguished cry, Wedge grabbed his sword and ran up the path.

11111111111111111111

"Squall! The Siren is nearby!"

The Seed had already drawn his gunblade and was looking around for the monster that had caused the avalanche. The area was now buried in stone, the point of the satellite dish sticking up at an odd angle above the rubble.

Everything else in the small valley was buried. Fortunately, that small valley had filled up and stopped the avalanche from reaching the cliff face that Squall and Shiva currently stood on.

Squall scanned the terrain, searching with both his eyes and his senses for the enemy. It confused him a bit, as there was nowhere to hide on this now open terrain, and considering the size of the last monster…

His senses alerted him to an attack half a second before it came. Shouting a warning to Shiva, Squall rolled left and brought his gunblade in a block position above his head, as a force impacted it, sending sparks off from the blade and knocking him backwards a few feet.

Getting back up into a sitting position, Squall saw Shiva square off with the…huh?

The ice queen had constructed a shield around herself. His eyes widened as he saw several deep gashes appear in the ice as though someone had clawed at it, but no one was standing there.

Squall jumped up and charged at his invisible opponent, striking where he though s/he would be. He was unsurprised when his blade clashed on solid air. Twisting his blade free, Squall thrusted at the approximate location of where his opponent should have been, but his blade passed through air.

He braced himself for an attack behind, but then Shiva's shield exploded outwards, sending shards of ice in a huge attack radius. Squall quickly covered his face with his arms, expecting to be hit with the shards as well, but the ice impacted a solid barrier, rather the monster that was standing in front of him.

"What the hell?" asked Squall quietly, as he backed up towards Shiva, his gunblade in the guard position, "Why is she invisible? I thought that the Siren's element was silence."

"The silence can mean many things," Shiva explained to him, "Silence is without sound, without sight, and is undetectable. You only notice her, because she is not the true Siren."

A horrible screeching sound, like nails on a chalkboard, echoed off the canyon walls, and redoubled on itself, making the whole mountain ring with the noise. A few rocks that still hung on to the cliff face were dislodged as well.

"That doesn't really sound like a siren." Squall deadpanned, removing his hands from his ears once the scream was over.

Suddenly, the ice shards that seemed to be floating in air dropped to the ground and shattered. A gray cloud of mist arose and swirled around the invisible creature, seeming to suck the very light out of the air around it.

Then the cloud exploded, leaving a figure in the center.

In all his traveling, Squall had never seen an uglier woman. If he had, he had mercifully forgotten her face.

The thing in front of them sort of resembled a human, with the exception of two black wings protruding from her back. The woman, or creature rather, was gray skinned with yellow eyes. In the place of hands, there were long yellow claws. Her gray hair was tangled, and her face was distorted, an ugly expression permanently branded on it.

Neither side moved for a moment. It was a face-off, seeing who would act first, waiting for the other party to take action. Finally, Shiva spoke.

"Foul creature," she spoke menacingly, her easygoing caring nature replaced by her ice queen persona that she was known for, "Release your hold upon the Siren's spirit!" As she spoke, the air temperature seemed to drop around them, making Squall shiver involuntarily.

The creature spoke, showing a row of yellow and decaying teeth, "Fool! You hold no power over me!"

"That may be true, but if you surrender now, I may ease your passing into the dark realm foul creature!"

"Even if the likes of you were enough to even threaten me, the power of Ultima Weapon will destroy you!"

Shiva was about to begin another tirade, but Squall coughed lightly into his fist, "As much as I like listening to these soliloquies, we're really not getting anywhere so can we skip to the action you 'fowl' creature?"

Both girls seemed to consider this for a moment before they each gave half a shrug, "Sure, why not?"

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'Nothing happens here for 2 years and 1 week after I get posted here Squall comes and…'

Wedge continued to think mutinously to himself as he threaded his way past the beasts and up the mountain. Fortunately a majority of the monsters were feeling the short avalanche and were not looking for a fight.

'I'll be lucky to be able to stay on as a guard after this! Damn you Squall, I was doing fine until you showed up.'

"Squall! Because of you, I've seen hell!" He finally shouted out loud. Unfortunately this alerted a large group of Anacondaurs to his presence.

"Damn you Squall!" He shouted before running as fast as he could up the mountain slope.

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Squall blinked once, and the Siren was gone, faded into the fog that had slowly built up during their discussion, unnoticed by both of them until it was too late.

"Damnit! I can't see a thing in this stuff!"

Out of nowhere, blows started coming. Squall could see her image one second but then it would be gone the next. Shiva took several glancing blows before being hit in the stomach and knocked to the ground.

"Shiva!" Swinging wildly, Squall was rewarded with a lucky cut on the harpies shoulder.

"I'm fine! But we need to clear this fog!"

"Stand back!"

Reaching into his stores of magic, Squall drew out a small portion of fire magic.

**WHAM!**

And stood still for a second too long. Managing to stay on his feet even though he was in pain, Squall completed his spell.

"FIRE AURA!"

The spell wasn't like a regular fire spell. Instead of a concentrated blast, it was more of a fiery shield that quickly expanded outwards, burning the fog away.

"Ow!"

Oops.

"Damnit Squall! At least give me a little warning first!" Shiva had jumped away from Squall onto the cliff face, sporting a few burns.

"I see you have seen through another of my clever tricks mortal! Perhaps I have underestimated you." The voice seemed to come from everywhere, redoubling off the canyon walls.

Squall brushed some imaginary dirt off his shoulder, "My name is Squall. And don't you forget it," his gunblade glowed blue with focused chi, "Because I'm the last mortal your gonna meet!"

"Confident are we?" The voice was mocking.

"You bet!"

'Shiva!' Squall spoke in his mind, 'Where is she?'

There was a moments pause before Shiva responded, 'Behind you!' she nearly shouted.

Squall's blade erupted in light as he went into the first stage of the lionheart. With a shout, he swung behind him in a full circle.

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Wedge finally crested the hill at the top of the mountain, just as Squall was unleashing his finishing move.

'What the…who is he fighting?'

It looked like Squall was shadowboxing or going through a form, but this was different. Every time Squall swung he could see a discharge of energy when the extended blade connected.

'The person's invisible?'

It was a mixture of awe and horror at the same time. It was graceful and deadly, even more powerful then their blasted GF helpers. Speaking of GFs…

Wedge looked around the battle scene again and saw Shiva, sitting in a meditative position a distance from the actual fight.

'That's a GF! I'd recognize Shiva anywhere! But…what's it doing?'

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Shiva sat and concentrated. If she concentrated hard enough, she could almost see the full being of the Siren-monster. As it was, she could see her well enough to tell Squall where she was.

Squall timed his combo perfectly. The monster was unsuspecting of an attack and was caught off guard. With a single sweep he knocked her into the air and jumped after her, unloading several hits while he was in midair, the sheer energy coming off each strike enough to keep him airborne.

With a final flourish and explosion, Squall finished off the combo and began to fall gently back to earth. Unfortunately…

**WHAM!**

For the second time that day, Squall found himself doubling over in midair. He had forgotten about the wings.

Shiva tried to warn him, but there was little he could do after the first strike. Blows rained down on him fast and hard, speeding up his decent towards the ground. Some point during the combo the harpy had dropped her invisibility, and began pummeling Squall with a malicious grin.

Finally, she cupped her hands together and brought them down. Hard.

Squall rolled in midair to take the fall on his back rather than his front, but it sill left him incapacitated.

Rolling over, Squall saw the harpy charging up one of her blasts. It was colorless, but seemed to distort the air around it, sucking it in and bending it into a ball shape. With an inhuman laugh, she let it loose.

Summoning his strength and biting back the pain, Squall rolled to the side just as the blast hit the ground, kicking up rubble and throwing him off to the side.

Quickly assessing himself, Squall found that his left arm couldn't move without intense pain. Glancing up from his prone position on the ground he saw the Siren charging another blast. He made the effort but he already knew he couldn't avoid it.

"ICICLE BLAST!"

There is a saying that goes, "Learn from the mistakes of others, as you don't have time to make them all yourself." The harpy apparently, had not learned that lesson from Squall, and had stood in one place for too long.

Unfortunately for Shiva, the blast had to go somewhere, and this one traveled straight into the cliff face, starting another small avalanche and burying Shiva under it. A large rock hit her on the head and she knew no more.

The harpy had not gotten off easy though. Her right wing was nearly torn off, while the left wing had several holes. Having lost the power of flight, the Siren careened into the rocks below.

With a grunt, Squall staggered to his feet, his left arm hanging uselessly at his side, the right holding his gunblade. He was unsurprised when the harpy rose as well.

There were small cuts all over her body, while the lionheart had left a large X shaped scar on her belly, bleeding freely. If he had been able to see her back, he would have also seen several wounds there as well.

Without fanfare, forewarning or any remote trace of skill, Squall lunged forward, swinging the gunblade clumsily. Squall was tired, but so was the harpy, and they both knew it.

Squall didn't know if GF's even had adrenaline, but the Harpy was able to dodge, if barely. Weak from blood loss, the gunblade fell from his fingers and his feet stumbled from under him.

Rolling over, Squall saw the harpy pick up his gunblade, "An interesting weapon," she said mockingly, "But utterly useless in the end." She threw the gunblade behind her.

The gunblade master put on his coldest look. If he were going to die, he would die fighting. His right hand groped for a rock, and found one that fit his hand perfectly. Summoning the last of his strength, he chucked it at her head.

She didn't dodge this one.

If it was possible, the face became even uglier. The yellowed teeth became fangs and the eyes shone a blood red. Raising a hand, energy slowly gathered in her palm, aiming directly for his head, "You Die now Mortal!"

**SHINK!**

There was a hiss of steel, and Squalls gunblade was suddenly protruding through the harpy's chest.

"Actually," commented Wedge as if he was talking about the weather, "I think it's a nice weapon really." With that, he pulled the trigger.

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Cid massaged his head. He had just gotten a call from the Dollet mayor, about his 'illegally parked aircraft.' Fortunately they weren't holding him responsible for it, as long as he cleaned it up. Good thing he was on good terms with Laguna.

No sooner had he called Esthar to ask for assistance, that he had gotten another call, telling him that the communications tower was destroyed. He was asked firmly, politically, and politely, just what they hell his man was doing up there. They weren't satisfied with his answer.

Running out of options, he had dispatched Squall's friends with orders to 'render assistance in any way they could.' Seeing how they didn't have the Ragnarock anymore, he had dispatched them by boat.

That was half an hour ago. And the phone was ringing again. Cid slowly beat his head against the wooden desk. Some days, it just didn't pay to get out of bed.

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A/N: Longest chapter to date. Hoped you liked the fight scene. I appreciate the support from all the people who reviewed my story.

Feel free to drop a review on your way out.


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: Update time already huh? I know what most of you were thinking. WTF took you so long? Well, to tell you the truth…

Squall: Like hell he will…

ClanCrusher: Shut up. Anyways, a while back, some aliens came to earth with the intention of conquering it. After a long hard drawn out and ridiculously pointless battle, I was able to drive off the aliens with my brother's smelly underwear. And that's what took me so long to update.

Squall: You don't even have a brother.

ClanCrusher: …

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"How long will it be before we reach shore?" asked Irvine.

"20 minutes," responded Quistis.

Squall's friends were a far cry from their usual attitudes.

Irvine had his custom rifle loaded and primed, carrying it over one shoulder, his eyes alert.

Selphie had changed into her seed uniform, which was better suited for combat then her usual attire. Her nun-chucks were draped across her shoulders ready to be called into action in a moment's notice.

Rinoa was checking over her magic stores for the third time, prepping them to be cast instantly.

Zell was also strangely quiet, seeming to mentally prepare himself for the task ahead, rather than make jokes and goof off.

Quistis was in full 'instructor mode' with her mind completely focused on the task that was coming.

"Man, what's gotten into you guys?"

Everyone turned to face Seifer. It was kind of surprising that he had volunteered to come in the first place, but by his reasoning, "anything that could take out the communications tower would be a worthy fight."

"I dunno," said Zell offhandedly, "I think I'm just gearing myself for the worst case scenario."

"Puh-lease," scoffed Seifer, "Were talking about the world hero, our commander. I'd be more worried about you guys."

"And why's that?" asked Quistis incredulously.

"That guy just lived through an ice storm, a plane crash, an avalanche, the tower explosion and god knows what else. I don't think you'd be able to handle that."

No one bothered to say anything. Instead, all of them turned towards the fast approaching land.

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The harpy stood stock still, not even looking down at the gunblade that was now sticking out of her chest.

SHINK!

In one swift movement Wedge pulled the gunblade from the Sirens body, then made a horizontal slice to behead her completely.

Shouldering the gunblade, Wedge calmly walked over to where Squall was lying, bloody and bruised, "You know, for once I can't really see how this could possibly be your fault."

"Well…that's good I guess," Squall was abruptly cut off as the pain all over his body made itself known.

"Keep still, you're bleeding pretty bad."

"I…have…cure…" he told Wedge, the words coming in between laborious breaths, "Draw it…from me…"

Reaching past Squall's defenses on his magic, Wedge carefully drew out the healing magic and used it on him, his superficial wounds healing rapidly and the bruises fading into healthy skin.

"I can't fix your broken arm. Something about that harpy's dark energy is fighting back against the healing magic."

"Stomach…hurts…"

Wedge thought for a second before drawing scan magic out from Squall's stock and using it on him, only to find…

"Squall! You have an internal cut!"

As if to punctuate his statement, the seed started hacking and coughing, spitting up blood all over Wedge's uniform. It was a credit to the soldier that he didn't even flinch.

"I'm…sorry Squall. There's nothing I can do about it."

"Its…ok…you tried." This was followed by another round of coughing. When he finally stopped, he continued, "Tell…Shiva…sorry."

"This is the part where I come in."

Wedge stood up shocked, and turned around to come face to face with the Guardian Force Siren.

Siren was easily the most beautiful GF that Wedge, or anyone else for that matter, had seen. She had two golden wings, tipped with purple on the ends, protruding from her head while the same golden colored hair ran down her back.

The body of the Siren couldn't have been more exposed if she had tried. Aside from two seashells covering her breasts and another pair covering her lower section, the siren was completely naked.

Stepping carefully over the rocks, the Siren brought her harp out from behind her back and began to play, walking towards Squall.

The Seed soldier propped himself painfully on his good arm and looked as the siren continued to walk towards him playing a beautiful, indescribable melody. Energy started flowing from the harp and into Squall's body.

And then, his whole body began to heal, and not just his wounds either. His internal cuts began to heal themselves and his broken arm reset itself. But it didn't stop there. All this time the Siren had been walking towards him and now she knelt right next to him. Slowly with a glowing green finger, Siren traced the scar on Squall's forehead.

Confused, Squall reached his hand up to his head and felt…nothing?

"You…you got rid of my scar?"

Smiling, Siren nodded at him. Offering him a hand, Squall took it and stood up, his body feeling 100.

"SIREN!"

The shout was the only warning Siren got before she was tackled by a blue blur in a fierce bear hug.

"Shiva? How on earth did you get free?"

"The same way you did, Squall over there helped me by defeating the monster my soul was trapped in."

"So I guess that I have you to thank for this then?" she asked turning her head towards Squall.

The mercenary shrugged his shoulders unconcerned, "You saved my life, and I freed you. Seems like a fair trade to me."

"Nonsense, it's partly my fault why I had to save you in the first place."

Gently freeing herself from her sister's death embrace, the siren began walking towards Squall again.

"Um…what are you MPHHPH!"

Nearly 10 years of training to become a Seed and another two years of traveling and fighting abroad could not prepare Squall for this situation. The Siren had come up and kissed him right on the lips, her tongue darting past Squall's non-existent, and shattered defenses.

"H…hey what are you doing?" shouted Shiva.

Siren continued the kiss for a few more moments before answering her, "I'm just thanking my rescuer."

"Um…guys?" cut in Wedge uncertainly.

"That doesn't mean you can just go lip locking with him! You barely know him!"

"So does that mean you can do it since you do know him?"

"Um…hey guys?"

"That's not the point!"

"Then what is your point?"

"My point is…well…um…"

"GUYS!"

Suddenly everyone turned and stared at Wedge.

"Um, there are people coming, so unless you want to be seen…"

Siren and Shiva vanished, leaving Wedge and Squall standing alone on the pile of rubble.

"So uh…you wanna tell me what the hell this is all about?"

"We'd like to know that too." Squall's gang had arrived, and Seifer was in front.

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_Squall! You need to get everyone down from the mountain._

_Why?_

_You remember how you and Shiva had to wait out an ice storm when you freed her?_

_Yeah. She said that she caused it because she had a power buildup and…oh s#+_

_Hurry._

"Damn man," said Seifer walking up to Squall, "From the way the rumors were going we thought you'd be dead twice over by now."

"Well, that wasn't too far off," he shrugged even as the rest of his group had crested the hill.

"Definitely your handiwork Squall," commented Zell, looking around at the metal and rocks strewn about everywhere, "Glad to see you haven't lost your touch."

"I'm just glad that your dad insured the Ragnarock," Said Quistis, cresting the hill.

"Um guys, we need to get off the mountain, right now." He hoped that he put enough urgency into his voice to get them to follow him without question.

No such luck.

"Hey partner, what's the rush? We just climbed all the way up here and were not climbing down without an explanation."

_Squall, hurry! We only have a few more minutes before the discharge!_

Squall reached out and took the gunblade from Wedge, putting it back in the holster on his back, "There will be time for that later. We need to go now."

"And why's that?" asked Rinoa, "What's so bloody secret that you can't tell us about it huh?"

_Squall!_

_I'm trying!_

And then, an absolutely ridiculous idea came to Squall's mind. So crazy, that it could actually work.

"Well, I'd tell you but…" everyone listened closely as Squall softened his voice, hanging on to his every word, "You have to catch me first."

With that, Squall called upon the power of both GF's and leaped over their heads, running down the mountain at full speed.

Selphie sweatdropped as everyone else picked themselves up from the massive facefault, "I think our commander's gone crazy."

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_They'll have to catch you first? Where the hell did you pull that from?_

_Well it worked didn't it?_

Running behind him was Wedge, Seifer, and the rest of his group. Fortunately, thanks to the Siren's treatment, Squall was nearly at full power while his friends were still tired from their climb up the mountain.

Finally, the group came to the bridge connecting the town's main square and the mountain.

_This should be far enough, _said the Siren, _The effects of the adrenaline boost I gave you should be wearing off right about now too._

Right on cue, Squall's legs collapsed out from under him.

_The hell? I thought you healed me!_

_I did, but you always need to rest after a healing to let it set in. What I gave you was a little boost so that you could get off the mountain before things got ugly._

"Alright Squall, we caught you. Now tell us what's going on."

Breathing heavily, Squall weakly raised a hand and pointed at the top of the mountain. Everyone followed his finger.

In his life, Squall had seen many explosions, every one of them loud and colorful. This explosion was neither of those.

For one second, all the noise around them stopped, as if their ears didn't register anything. Then, there was a huge distortion in the air, like rippling heat waves, starting at the top of the mountain and traveling downwards towards the base.

And then, the entire mountain blew up.

Sound returned in a rush as enormous rocks began to fall all around them, miraculously missing the bridge and the people on it. The entire scene of destruction only lasted a few minutes but in the eyes of the observers it seemed to last an eternity.

As the last of the rocks laid to rest in the pile of rubble that used to be the mountain, everyone turned back towards the Seed, shocked expressions on their faces. Squall only gave them a small smirk before passing out completely.

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Squall leaned back in the armchair he had envisioned for himself while Shiva and Siren reclined on a couch in front of him. There was a pleasant fire going in the fireplace in the room, making the entire affair quite comfortable.

"Well," said Squall nonchalant, "That could have gone better."

"Really? How so?" Asked the Siren, "After all, you did free me."

"Well, to tack on to my extensive damage list, I've caused a whiteout in Shumi Village, crashed an insanely expensive airship on the Dollet beach, destroyed the communications tower which belonged to our worst enemies, and blew up a god damn mountain. I don't know about you Shiva, but I think our so called 'secrecy' has been blown to hell."

"No one has seen us though," put in Shiva, "That's something."

"Except Wedge, and he's duty bound to report it to his superior officer, and it's only a matter of time before Galbadia comes knocking on Balamb's door, demanding my head on a platter."

"Do you think that you need to silence him?" asked Shiva suddenly.

Although it surprised Squall that Shiva was the one who had asked him, Squall had already thought about it, "No. I'm going to make Wedge an offer he can't refuse."

"It had better work," put in Siren, "He may have saved your life but he is insignificant compared to the rest of the world."

"If you cannot guarantee his silence," continued Shiva, "Then we will silence him for you."

Although anyone looking at Squall wouldn't have noticed it, the Seed felt an involuntary shiver go down his spine. These women were serious. Deadly serious.

"You won't have to," assured Squall, "Now I'd really like to get some rest before everyone else tries to pound the story out of me."

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For the first time in his life, Wedge was able to sleep in. Every day he had been in the Glabadian army, his life was lived from one boring day of guard duty to the next, waking up early and going to bed late.

But now, the communication tower wasn't even there anymore. If HQ wanted him to guard a pile of rubble then they could stick it where the sun don't shine. He earned his rest.

"Hey Wedge, you up?"

_God damnit, just let me sleep for once._

Then he realized who the voice belonged to.

"Squall? Is that you?"

"We need to talk. Get your stuff together."

The soldier really didn't want to get out of bed, but if Squall was willing to talk then maybe he could get some answers to the questions that he had.

Wedge followed Squall out of the infirmary and onto the beach. It wasn't even 5:00 AM and the whole city was quiet, the shoreline deserted.

"So are you going to answer my questions now? Like what the hell I stabbed up there?"

"I'll answer your questions in a bit, but first I have a couple questions to ask you."

Despite his impatience, Wedge bit back his scathing remarks, "Okay, shoot."

"Now that you've messed up on your latest assignment, what do you plan on doing now?"

Wedge shrugged, "Quit the military and find a job somewhere I guess. I heard Esthar had some openings for soldiers and people with military training. What's the other question?"

"My other question is," Squall withdrew a small envelope he had prepared earlier that morning, "Do you want a job at Balamb Garden?" Casually, he tossed the envelope at Wedge who caught it out of the air.

Wedge, opened the envelope with shaking fingers. Inside was a letter of recommendation to headmaster Cid, along with an application for employment, "A job? But…why? I worked for the enemy."

"Two reasons. It is completely my fault that you're jobless right now and I feel kinda guilty," he admitted, "But the second, it because I think that you could be useful to us."

Wedge carefully sealed the envelope again before speaking, "How? I'm just a private…well I'm not even that anymore."

"You had to do something to be promoted to commander in chief to Biggs. Not to mention you hold the knowledge of all the tactics, strategies and training. I believe that making you a squad leader will be very beneficial to the garden as a whole."

The ex-private of the Galbadian army looked at the Seed commander with new respect, "I…I'll try not to let you down…sir." He added as an afterthought.

Squall merely saluted the new recruit and walked away.

Then Wedge realized something, "H-hey! What about my questions?" But Squall was already gone.

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At the mayor's office…

"Well, I suppose I should thank you," said the mayor cheerfully as he sat across from Squall.

"Why's that sir?" asked Squall genuinely confused.

"Now that that mountain is out of the way, we have more room for housing development along the beach. We've recently had a population upsurge but we didn't have any room to expand, but with a few renovations, we can sell the land you made as prime real estate. You turned the whole mountain into a plain."

_Well isn't that lucky? _Thought Siren,

"So…you're not angry about the communications tower being destroyed?"

The mayor let out a heartfelt laugh, "Why should I be? Its not like it belonged to me in the first place. Drink?" The politician had withdrawn a bottle from his desk full of amber liquid.

"No thanks. I don't take spirits. It turns me into someone I don't like."

The mayor nodded understandingly before pouring himself a glass, "I don't suppose that you could level the other mountain for us too? We could turn this place into a prime beach resort."

_Who knows? _Thought Shiva with a hint of mirth, _if we find another GF in the other mountain…_

_I'd rather not go through this again._

_You didn't like my kiss? _Asked Siren innocently.

Squall mentally shut up.

"I won't bother asking you about your missions. I know all about the 'Top Secret' work and all that, but do you think that you'll be causing any more damage here?"

"No sir, I think my work is pretty much done. I'm leaving with the Esthar cleaning crew as soon as they show up."

The talk continued for a while, the mayor asking about how things were going on outside of his neck of the woods and other small talk like that. Finally, after extending an invitation to him to come back anytime, the mayor left to publicly address the town about the recent incident.

Picking up the phone on the mayors desk, Squall steeled himself dialed Headmaster Cid.

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1 hour later…

The mayor walked back into his office to find Squall still sitting in his "guest" chair. His phone was off the hook and resting on the polished desk.

"You're still here?" asked the Mayor puzzled.

"Yeah."

"Are you…waiting for something?"

"Yeah."

"And what are you waiting for?" demanded the mayor, slightly annoyed.

"For my boss to finish," At this Squall pointed at the receiver. Still puzzled the mayor picked up the phone and placed it to his ear…

…only to suddenly drop it as his eardrum nearly got blown out. Staring at the phone on the desk for a few seconds, the mayor turned to Squall.

"How long has he been at it?"

"Bout an hour now."

The mayor checked his watch.

"Wanna go have lunch?"

"Sure."

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A/N: And there you have it. Not a lot of action, more like the calm before the storm. Please leave a review before you hit the back button on your browser.


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: I really can't think of anything to say, so I'll just start the story.

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"_It's not going to be a big deal Squall. Just go in there and tell them the story we rehearsed. You have the perfect poker face, use it!" _encouraged Shiva as Squall stood outside the meeting room.

"_I don't like lying to my friends though,"_ thought back Squall.

"_It's not lying, its excluding information that they don't need to know,"_ reassured Siren, _"Besides, if we want to keep this quest going without Omega Weapon dropping in on us midway then we need to keep our secrecy."_

Squall sighed, he had gone through this conversation several times with the Guardians and there didn't seem to be any way he could ease his friend's minds without lying to them.

Steeling himself, Squall opened the door and took a seat across from his friends.

"So Squall," spoke Quistis after a moment of silence, "What have you been up to?"

"I was just completing my mission that Headmaster Cid assigned me. There was a report of an ice monster near Shumi village and Cid wanted me to take care of it."

"But why didn't you tell any of us?" asked Rinoa suddenly, "You know we would have come with you,"

"Mr. Macho here probably thought that he could take the monster on all by himself," broke in Seifer, "He's been in the training center nearly every day since the defeat of Ultimeca."

"Actually, that's exactly what I was thinking," silence followed his statement, "Call it a little boredom reliever if you will,"

"Boredom reliever?" inquired Zell.

"There really isn't a need for war heroes in times of peace Zell."

"But what happened up on the mountain? What made that explosion?" asked Selphie.

"It was another one of those critters that I defeated on Shumi Island. After they die they have this nasty effect of self destructing. The one on Shumi Island was an ice monster and after I defeated it, I had to camp out in a cave for a few days while a huge blizzard passed. It was just dumb luck that I found out another one was here."

"Do you think there's any more of them?" asked Quistis.

"Probably not," assured Squall, "And besides, even if there were more of them, they don't go out of their way to attack humans. The two I fought were pretty much in abandoned areas."

Squall continued answering the questions his friends threw at him for the next 20 minutes. A corner of his mind noticed that Rinoa had stayed silent throughout the whole exchange but he didn't think too much about it.

"Well, if that's everything then, I need to go meet with the cleanup crew from Esthar…"

"Who was that woman who spoke on the radio?"

Squall stopped dead in his tracks.

_Shiva, what the hell is she talking about?_

_Oh crap _responded Shiva _Remember when we were trying to get control over the Ragnarock and Cid contacted us?_

_Don't tell me you…_

_I did._

_Well what do I do then?_

_Play dumb. _Broke in Siren, _Just play it off as a malfunction in the communication system._

"Woman?" asked Squall, trying to sound as confused as he could, "What are you talking about?"

"Don't play dumb with me!" shouted Rinoa, standing up suddenly, "A woman's voice came over the speaker and said, 'We're trying not to get killed at the moment.'"

"Okay first of all," said Squall cutting her off abruptly, "Where in the hell would I pick up a woman when all I did was fly my ass straight into a blizzard after leaving base? And secondly, why would I take a civilian on a solo seed mission when there is a possibility of death?"

"I don't know," retorted Rinoa, "I'm the one who's asking here."

"As Cid may have already told you, this was a SOLO mission. That means there was no other human being with me."

_Technically true _thought Siren, _we're not exactly human are we?_

Rinoa sat down, but her expression said everything. Squall hadn't actually answered her question, he had just diverted her focus.

_That girl is your X? _Asked Siren.

_Yeah._

_  
Quite a handful isn't she?_

_You have no idea._

_So are you single now?_

_Um…well…_

"Squall!"

"Hmm?" said Squall, suddenly looking up, "I'm sorry, I was thinking, what were you saying?"

Selphie rolled her eyes, "I said what are you going to do now? Is the mission over? Or are there more of those things?"

Squall was about to respond when a sudden inspiration hit him, "Actually, yes. I am coming back to the garden. Really no point in sticking around here now that those things are dead."

"Aw man, I was hoping for some action," whined Zell, getting up and stretching.

Seifer just grunted and didn't say anything.

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_So Siren, can you sense any more GF's around here?_ asked Squall mentally as he left the closure where his friends were.

_Not at the moment, _responded the GF, "_But I've been scanning over your travels with your friends and I think…_

_That Ifrit's spirit is lurking somewhere in the fire caverns back on Balamb Island?_

…_Actually that was exactly what I was thinking. How did you know?_

_Originally, we drew your bodily form from Elvorett up on the communication tower. Ifrit's spirit was found in the fire cavern, so following that thought through logically it makes sense that we'd look for their spirits in the places where we found their bodies._

_How did you find me then? _Broke in Shiva, _I though you got me from your computer._

_I just found you by dumb luck._

_Oh. So does this mean you know where all of the GF's are?_

_No, I remember the location of most of them, but we never found all 16 of the main guardian forces._

_Where are we going anyways? _Asked Siren.

_We're going to go talk to Wedge again; we need to give him his interview._

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Wedge sighed to himself as he picked up the sword given to him by the military. He wasn't a bad fighter with it but after his original training, he could never fully adapt to the weapon.

"Wedge!"

"Huh?" Wedge looked around and saw Squall coming towards him, his gunblade drawn in his hand. Quickly recalling his talk with him earlier that day, Wedge jumped up to attention.

"Draw your sword Wedge; let's have a little practice match."

"Huh? But I though…"

"It's an evaluation of your skills, don't worry about beating me."

"Okay…" tentatively, Wedge drew his sword and got into a ready stance, Squall just kept his gunblade on his shoulder. The two stood still for a few seconds, and then Squall attacked.

By the first strike, Wedge could already tell he was outmatched. Squall was wielding his gunblade one-handed and the force of his strikes nearly tore the sword from his grip. Abandoning his training with the long sword, Wedge stepped into a completely alien stance and retaliated.

Squall's eyes widened in surprise at the new stance and the pattern of attacks. He knew them like the back of his hand, almost as if Wedge was…

A moment of hesitation and Wedge capitalized on, and his sword almost nicked him. Dancing back out of range, Squall countered the pattern with a well timed strike and disarmed him, flinging his sword off to the side.

Not wasting a moment Wedge dived out of the way of Squall's probing strike and retrieved his weapon, coming to his feet a good distance away.

"That's good enough," said Squall, resting the gunblade on his shoulder, "I recognize that pattern, you were trained on a gunblade weren't you?"

"You can tell?" asked Wedge surprised, "But I haven't used a gunbalde in nearly 4 years!"

"Your grip on the sword was completely wrong, it was held too tight to be effective, which was why I was able to disarm you. A gunblade requires a tighter grip, not only because of its weight but also because of the force of the shot. The pattern you used was also one of the basic gunblade forms, but it was ineffective because of the difference in size."

Wedge turned his eyes downcast, "My dad used to be a gunblade maker," he admitted, "Ever since I was little I had trained on them, but since only very few people in the world use gunblades, he didn't make much money. I joined the army to help him pay for expenses, but they made me use this sword."

Squall smirked, "At Balamb garden, we don't have any weapon policies. You use what you can cause the most damage with."

"Does that mean…?" he looked up hopefully.

In response, Squall tossed him his gunblade, "Go on, give her a whirl."

Wedge caught it one handed and took a firm grip on it, getting into a basic stance, familiarizing himself with the added weight and size. Slowly, he began to move, going through an old kata Squall had mastered when he was ten years old.

Beside him, the seed commander looked on with a trainer's eye. Despite the fact that he hadn't picked up a gunblade in five years, his form was pretty solid, and his mistakes few. Given a month he could probably be back to his old form.

Wedge finished the kata with a flourish, a one handed thrust followed by a parry and a crescent strike, before resting it on his shoulder.

"Not bad," said Squall taking the gunblade back and sheathing it, "A little rusty but good overall."

"It's a nice blade," said Wedge wiping a small bit of sweat that had developed on his brow away, "How long have you been using it?"

"For about a year now, I had it specially made for my final confrontation with Ultimeca."

"I thought so. My dad made that blade."

"Really? Small world." said Squall mildly surprised, "You'll have to thank him for me sometime."

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The boat ride home was incredibly tense. Squall's group had been at odds with Wedge and his superior Biggs before, and people kept shooting suspicious glances at him, regardless of how many times Squall assured them it was okay. It finally took a direct order as captain of the garden to allow him on the boat.

Rinoa was still shooting furious glances at Squall as well. She hadn't bought his excuses and they both knew it.

_What the hell is her problem? _Asked Squall as Rinoa continued to stare angrily at him.

_Well you are with two completely different women now. _Said Siren mischievously, _She's probably jealous._

_She doesn't own me! _He shot back angrily.

_Oh please, _broke in Shiva, _Girls like her always think their boyfriends are cheating on them. It's a general fact of life._

_She's not even my girlfriend anymore!_

_Doesn't mean she can't act like it. _Responded Siren.

Squall idly noted it was amazing how human the two girls seemed despite the fact they were incredibly powerful Guardian forces.

_A guardian force has needs too, _Said Siren mischievously.

Squall mentally blocked off the rest of his thoughts.

"Yo Squall, you up for a game of cards?"

Squall looked up from his conversation to see Seifer casually shuffling a large collection of cards. At random he picked five cards from his deck and laid them facedown on the small table in the middle of the ship.

"What are the rules?" asked Squall taking out his own deck.

"Nothing but Random."

_What are you playing? _Asked Shiva curiously.

_A card game, _responded Squall shuffling his cards, _Just watch, you'll understand._

Playing by the random rule was incredibly difficult if you weren't prepared. You might get four weak cards and one strong card and end up loosing your best card. But then again, the same thing could happen to your opponent. Fortunately for him, Squall didn't really carry around anything below boss level cards ever since the random rule was spread.

Picking five cards from his deck, Squall laid them face down on the table, "What's the wager?"

Seifer smirked, "All."

Make that incredibly risky. Wagering an All on a random game was practically suicidal.

"I accept."

"As the challenged, I'll go first," said Squall. Picking up his hand, he saw what fate had given him.

_Holy shit I better not loose this hand, _thought Squall evenly, letting his perfect poker face come into play, _always better to start off with a perfect defense._

"I'll play Edea to the lower left hand corner," said Squall placing his card. It had taken him forever to get that card from her. It was the perfect defensive card, having two A ranks in its north and east sides, making it near invincible when played in a corner. Really the only time it could be taken was when some of the more…_exotic _rules were in play.

"I'll play minotaur on the lower right," said Seifer, putting down the GF card. Minotaur was just a step below Edea, having two 9 rankings on his north and west side.

Squall looked at his hand again and smirked, "I'll play PuPu in the lower middle and take your Minotaur," It was the only level five card he carried around. With one A ranking on the right side and all its other stats below three it was a practically useless card. The way he played it though, it would require Seifer to play to the middle if he wanted to tie the game. And there was only one card in the whole game that didn't have at least one stat below 6.

"I'll play the GF Doomtrain to the upper right." So he wasn't going to fall for the bait. Probably a good idea, the card doomtrain had an A rank on its south and west sides making it impossible to take in this game.

No matter, all he had to do was play defensively for the rest of the game and he'd win, "I'll play Laguna to the middle right." That way only his 9 rank was showing.

Seifer smirked, "I play Alexander to the center." An A rank on the right and a four rank on the bottom.

Ouch. There goes Laguna and PuPu. The score was four to two now, Seifer's favor. Fortunately, Seifer had played Alexander's weak side, a two rank, on the left. And with a nine rank on the top, Squall doubted Seifer would be able to take it back again.

"I'll play Squall, middle left and take Alexander." Two spots left and the score was tied. The game would all depend on Seifer's last card.

"I'll play Zell in the upper middle." So he did have one A rank left. He was taking a huge risk though. If Squall didn't have anything that could beat a rank six on the right, Seifer would win. Otherwise a combo would occur that would take every card on the field except doomtrain.

"I play Shiva in the upper right hand corner," And Shiva had a rank 7 on her right side. The ice GF took Seifer who took Alexander who re-took PuPu and Laguna, bringing the score 8-2 Squalls favor.

"Shouldn't have gambled that last one," said Squall, "What were you holding back?"

Seifer grunted and tossed the card Siren onto the table with the other cards. They belonged to Squall now, per the rules. Thinking for a second, Squall picked up his cards and the Siren card, "You can take the others back," he said noncommittally, "I'm not much of a card player myself."

The other gunblade master rolled his eyes, "Yeah and I suppose that you got those cards by asking nicely huh?" Nevertheless Seifer gathered up the rest of his cards.

"It's amazing what saving the world can do for you," replied Squall nonchalant.

Silence filled the room. Squall felt everyone's eyes on him.

"What?" he asked finally.

"Did you just…make a joke?" asked Selphie hesitantly.

Squall didn't respond, opting instead to lean back and try to fall asleep.

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"So our accident budget will be able to cover the damages to Dollet?"

"Fortunately yes," responded Cid leaning back in his chair, "the only real damage that was done to the place happened to the communications tower, property damage was down to a minimum…for once."

Squall ignored the jibe, Cid had the right to be a little upset, "And what about the Ragnarock?"

"Completely totaled. Laguna said that repairs would take at least a week working at full capacity but they really can't spare the manpower on it at the moment so he estimated about a month."

"And Wedge?"

"Already on payroll. As captain of the garden you can place him where you see fit."

"Excellent. If that's all?"

"Actually Squall, there's something I wanted to ask you,"

_Oh boy here it comes, _said Shiva mentally.

_Got your liar face on? _Asked Siren.

"Just what are you up to? I've known you for nearly 6 years now Squall; I know when you're hiding something."

"Actually sir I wasn't…"

"Now hold on a second," interrupted Cid before Squall could make his excuses, "Before you start denying everything I want you to think about this. Now, I'll believe anything you say, but if I know what I'm dealing with I can help you."

When Squall didn't respond Cid took that as a sign to continue, "You have access to all the gardens resources, but I've been around a while," Cid had stood up and was now pacing back and forth behind his desk, "I know people Squall, I've got connections and I know the right people who can get you access to anywhere."

_Is he actually trying to bribe me? _Asked Squall slightly confused.

_Seems like it, _responded Siren, _but what does he have to gain from it?_

"If you'll pardon my asking sir, why do you want to know so badly? For all you know this could just be another of the dozens of grunt missions that the garden does on a daily basis."

Cid stopped pacing and faced the window, "Did you know I used to be a mercenary once?"

Squall's eyes widened in authentic surprise, "You were?"

"Oh yes. They don't let just anyone become headmaster of a garden. I was signed on during the Galbadian unification wars about twenty years ago. After the war was over, all the mercenaries were out of work, so we went on to create these gardens, basically mercenary havens."

"That's an interesting history lesson sir, but that still doesn't tell me why you want to know about my mission."

"The truth is Squall, I'm bored out of my mind sitting behind this desk filing out paperwork. I can't fight like I used to but I've got political standing that comes with age. So what do you think? You let me in on the mission and I'll smooth your way, how about it?"

_Just when you think you know someone…_ thought Squall idly, _Well, what do you guys think?_

_I've been asleep for a few hundred years but if what I've been reading from your memories is correct we might need someone like him in the political field, _responded Siren.

_Yeah that's what I've been thinking…wait a sec, you were reading through my memories?!_

_Fight about it later, _broke in Shiva, _the point is I think we should take this guy up on his offer._

Cid watched curiously as Squall's expression changed a few times as if he was arguing with himself. Finally the commander closed his eyes, his poker face set back in place, "Alright Cid, but from this moment on you're sworn to secrecy, got that?"

The headmaster nodded.

"Alright, on out."

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A/N: Mostly filler. I'm working on developing some of the lesser known characters rather than the actual cast. No particular reason, that's just my style. Remember, all constructive criticism is appreciated.


	8. Chapter 8

A/N: To answer all of your questions…yes, yes, yes, no, definitely not, yes, no, and maybe

A/N: To answer all of your questions…yes, yes, yes, no, definitely not, yes, no, and maybe. Now, on with the story.

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"So let me get this straight," said Cid as he eyed Shiva and Siren sitting next to Squall, "You're saying that the GF's are actually minor deities enslaved to Ultima Weapon?"

Shiva looked thoughtful, "Well, we're not actually gods, more like lesser spirits, but for all intents and purposes that's correct."

Cid leaned back in his chair and sighed. Reaching under his desk he brought out a bottle of amber colored liquid and a glass.

"Sir?"

The headmaster poured himself a glass and stared into the air as if in deep thought, holding the glass out in front of him, "I'm ashamed to admit it, but I never even really thought about it before."

"About what?"

"About this!" he practically yelled, gesturing to the GF's general direction, "We used them like slaves! Forced them to battle for us, and forced them to kill for us."

Squall stayed silent, not really knowing what to say. The only time he had ever seen the headmaster shout at anyone was when he fought with Norg.

"I never even questioned it," continued Cid in a softer voice, "Never even thought about it." He tilted his head back and drowned the glass in one drink, "What do we have to do to set this right?" he asked, a serious look coming over his face.

"Every GF that was imprisoned by Ultima weapon has three parts that need to be brought together," explained Siren after a moment of silence, "The first thing is our body, the part that you guys posses."

"When I went to fight the ice monster in the Shumi region, I had Shiva junctioned to me," put in Squall.

"The second part is the hard one. Ultima weapon separated our spirits from our bodies and fashioned his own twisted versions of the GF's from them. In order to free our spirits the monsters must be defeated, and then our bodies can re-merge with our spirits."

"And the third?" asked Cid beginning to pour another glass.

"The final thing we need is an anchor to this world. An avatar if you will. Without one, we are forced back into the divine realms. Currently, Squall anchors Shiva and I to this world. The monsters that contained our spirits were pseudo-anchors. Ultima weapon also has his own personal anchor to this world as well."

"He's a GF?" asked Squall curiously.

"No. Ultima weapon is the ultimate darkness, the representative of everything evil. Our power is insignificant compared to his, yet he too must follow the laws of the universe and therefore must have an anchor."

"Do you know who it is?" asked Squall.

"No we do not. Even if we did though, it would not do us any good. He has enough minions and followers to wipe us out if he ever got wind of our plans. That is why we must rescue the GF's in secret and not let anyone know about this mission under any circumstances. If the avatar of Ultima Weapon ever gets wind of what's going on, he will destroy us."

"Why?" asked Cid suddenly.

"Hmm?"

"Why is he doing this? What does he have to gain from corrupting the GF's like this?"

"Simple," said Shiva solemnly, "He wants to destroy this world, plunge it into darkness and devour it. Ultima weapon is the ultimate darkness, he feeds on the pain and suffering of the planet and grows stronger from it."

Silence shadowed the room for a moment. Cid poured himself another drink and sipped it slowly.

"Well god damn that's depressing," said Squall suddenly, "And that's something coming form me."

Everyone was momentarily shocked out of their stupor. Squall continued as if he hadn't noticed, "Oh please, this so called Ultima Weapon is nothing more than a puffed up version of every other megalomaniac trying to destroy the world."

Squall stood up and started walking around the room, "First it was Galbadia, then it was Adel, then it was Ultimeca, and now it's this wacko. Who cares? This guy is just another asshole in a long line of assholes and I'm going to kick this guy's ass just as I did everyone else's."

Cid paused, his glass halfway to his mouth. Smiling, he set the glass back down, "I knew I made the right choice when I made you commander of this garden."

"And I knew I made the right choice when I anchored myself to him," said Shiva. She was feeling his intense determination and confidence through the link she shared with him and it was hard not to catch the feeling.

"Tomorrow, we're going to go to the fire cavern and we're going to beat the ever loving crap out of that monster that has Ifrit's soul."

"We? Who's coming with you?"

"Wedge for one. He was the one who killed the monster imprisoning Siren, with my own gunblade in fact. He already knows too much about this to not keep him involved. I'm also taking Zell as well."

"Zell?" asked Shiva, Siren, and Cid simultaneously.

"He's got Ifrit's body junctioned to him so he's going to need to come along. Not to mention," he continued walking towards the elevator door, "He's been listening to us for a while now." With that he punched the open button and the fist fighter came stumbling out.

Squall rubbed his head, absentmindedly trying to find the familiar groove of the scar Seifer had left him even though it was no longer there. "You know Zell, it's a good thing I need you right now otherwise I probably wouldn't stop them from killing you."

Zell looked up from his position on the ground to see Shiva and Siren holding a silence blast and an ice spear respectively, "That's harsh man…"

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"Well," said Squall as he walked with Zell through the halls of the garden. "I hope you're ready to see this mission through to the end because if you want to back out, I'm going to have to kill you for eavesdropping on a very private conversation."

"Woah dude," said Zell waving his hands out in front of him frantically. "You know I'm in this with you until the end right? We're best buds man!"

"Look Zell, I don't think you really appreciate the seriousness of this situation," explained Squall slightly exasperated. "This isn't just some megalomaniac trying to destroy the world; this person literally wants to eat our universe, for no other reason than it's his nature. If he gets an inkling as to what we're doing, we could wake up dead."

"Um…if we're dead, how are we gonna wake up?"

Squall briefly wondered if he should answer him with an insult or a blow to the head but before he could do either, Zell spoke, his voice taking on a more serious tone.

"Look man, it's cool. I've always got your back. That's what friends do." With that, Zell began to walk in the opposite direction from Squall's office, hands in his pockets.

"Zell!"

The fist fighter looked back over his shoulder.

"Thanks."

The SeeD merely gave a thumbs up in reply.

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"_Friendship is truly a powerful thing," _mind-spoke Shiva solemnly_. "Zell seemed willing to follow you to the ends of the earth even though this quest may put his very soul at risk."_

Squall was quiet for several seconds before responding. _'It's hard to tell sometimes if Zell is just too brave for his own good or too stupid. Either way, he's reliable enough"_

"_I think he's kinda cute," _spoke in Siren.

"_I think you have a wide strike zone," _responded Shiva

"_I think you're just jealous."_

"_**I **__think you need to shut up and let me work!"_

Shiva and Siren were silent for a minute.

"_Don't worry, he's not nearly as good looking as you," _assured Siren.

"_Definitely," _agreed Shiva.

"I see you've gotten rid of my little tattoo."

Squall looked up from the papers on his desk. Even though he had barely been gone for a week, the amount of work that had piled up in his absence was reaching FUBAR levels.

"So how did you manage that? Some new spell of yours?"

It took Squall a second to realize that Seifer was talking about his missing scar. "A pretty magical girl took care of it for me," he replied seriously.

"_Hey! I am a Guardian of Earth! Do not put me on the same level of that Sailor Moon slut!"_

"_How the hell do you know who Sailor Moon is anyways?" _asked Shiva.

"_I was just looking through Squall's memories. Did you know he was a bit of a pervert when he was a kid?"_

Seifer looked at Squall strangely as he suddenly whacked himself on the side of the head. "Are you okay man?"

'_Oh nothing,' _though Squall silently, _'Just trying to get the voices in my head to shut up.'_

Out loud he said, "Nothing. This paperwork is driving me insane."

Seifer smirked and sat down, kicking his feet on a stack of papers lying on the commander's desk.

"By all means, have a seat," said Squall sarcastically.

Seifer chuckled and picked up a random sheet of paper. "Permission to double the amount of hot-dogs ordered? Sounds like work befitting of a captain."

"Did you want something or are you just here to gloat the fact that you don't have to do paperwork?"

"Both actually. I've finally decided that I'm tired of staying at the head of the disciplinary committee."

Squall looked up skeptically. "And what does this have to do with me?"

Sefier shrugged, "You're the captain now. You have to arrange the SeeD field tests, and we are a few months overdue."

The captain paused in the middle of writing his signature. That was one of the many "perks" of being captain that Cid had failed to mention.

"Got any ideas?" he pressed.

"Yes actually. I was thinking of sending you and everyone else who gives me these papers into the fire cavern to duke it out and promoting the last one standing to a SeeD."

"Damn man, when did you pick up a sense of humor?"

"Around the time that I learned that being a depressing person in a depressing situation doesn't help morale that much. So why the sudden interest?"

"I'm bored," he said simply, "While you were off in the artic fighting giant ice monsters, I was here teaching the junior students how to shoot fire at Irving. Not that that wasn't fun," he amended quickly, "But being a SeeD has to be a hell of a lot more interesting than this."

Squall raised an eyebrow.

"I mean, being in the field and such. You couldn't push the position of commander on me if you tried."

"Yes well, Cid didn't have to try. He just said it and it happened."

The two gunblades-men were silent for a moment.

"So seriously, what are you going to do for the SeeD field test?"

"Hell if I know," said Squall, shifting another paper to his outbox. "We don't exactly have a major war going on anywhere that we can send random scrubs out to like they did you and me."

"Hell Squall, if you don't have a war going on then just make one happen."

Squall sighed, "Alright Seifer, I'll schedule the SeeD exam two weeks from now. I have some business that I need to take care of first though."

Seifer pulled another paper off of the desk. "Permission to switch the gas used in the garden cars from premium to unleaded? Yep, sounds like tough business to me."

"Leave."

'_It's no use,' _thought Squall resignedly seconds after Seifer left, _'I'm just not cut out for paperwork.'_

Sweeping the stack of papers on his desk onto the floor, Squall grabbed his gunblade and headed for the garden entrance.

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"Do you know how to spar Shiva?"

"You mean the thing you and Seifer did where you cut up each others faces?"

Squall sighed. "Yeah, kinda like that, except without the cutting of faces. It's a mock fight basically. It's supposed to hone your skills."

The time was just after noon and Squall was with Shiva and Siren in a small forest clearing a couple miles away from Balamb.

Shiva looked at him skeptically. "Sorry Squall, but I don't think you could live through a Diamond Dust."

Squall raised an eyebrow. "Oh really? And what do you think your monster avatar did, pelt me with hail?"

On the sidelines, Siren chuckled, the sound reminding Squall of gently flowing water, "He's got you there Shiva."

Shiva humped and turned her head reminding Squall of a little kid, "I am much more powerful than that weak little monster."

Squall bit his tongue before the retort could pass his lips.

Unfortunately, Siren said it for him. "Oh really, then how did that "weak little monster" manage to hold your spirit for so long?"

Shiva glared daggers at the other GF.

"Alright, alright that's enough. The point is Shiva, what would you do if you couldn't use your immense ice powers?"

The ice guardian only gave it a second's thought, "No one can stop me from using my powers."

"Alright then, what if the thing you're fighting is an ice monster then?"

"Just because they're made of ice doesn't mean I can't freeze them in their tracks."

"Granted. But what if you found yourself in a situation where you couldn't use your ice powers? Or rather...shouldn't?"

"I don't see how that's relevant considering I can always use my ice powers."

Squall sighed and rubbed his head, "Alright, I can see we're going to have to do this the hard way."

Faster than Siren or Shiva could track, Squall's hand darted forward and touched Shiva on the shoulder. The ice queen felt a brief flare of magic before Squall took his hand away again.

As soon as the gunblade wielder took his hand away, Shiva felt an odd sensation pass through her, like a gate slamming shut. The feeling made her stagger back a bit.

"What you have just been hit with," explained Squall dropping into teacher mode, "Is a particularly nasty spell of my own invention. It's a combination of silence, curse, and pain and completely locks away the magic of the recipient and even goes as far as to shut down a small portion of their innate battle aura."

Disbelieving, Shiva desperately tried to reach for her powers only to run straight into a mental glass wall. Shaking her head to ward of the slight dizziness, Shiva shot Squall a glare.

"Of course you were able to hit me with it when I wasn't expecting it!"

Squall fought not to smirk. "Surprise is a key part of battle at times. Yes, I did take you by surprise but how does it make you feel that I can disable all those ice powers of yours with a single touch?"

Shiva's eyes fell to the ground, the obvious left unsaid.

"Nobody likes feeling helpless Shiva," he said solemnly, "and that is why, as SeeD's, we train every aspect of our being, not just our strongest parts."

With that, Squall walked back over to Shiva and patted her on the shoulder. Instantly the ice guardian felt the barriers around her powers fall. Just to be sure, she formed an ice spear in her hand.

"In truth, the spell would only last against someone like you for about five minutes," explained Squall to a puzzled Shiva, "Eventually your aura would overpower my spell, but do you think you could last five minutes?"

Shiva glared at him before using her powers to mold the ice spear in her hand to the shape of a sword. Squall drew his gunblade and flipped the safety on.

_**One minute and forty-four and a half seconds later…**_

"Not that I'm complaining," said Shiva gently rubbing her hand where Squall had hit to disarm her, "But why doesn't Siren have to go through any of this?"

"Oh she will, I just decided to torment you first."

"Great, I feel loved," she said sarcastically as she went to retrieve her ice-blade for the third time.

Shiva had obtained the faintest of fighting skills from her time junctioned to Squall. It was hard not to pick something up when it was pretty much all he thought about. Unfortunately, seeing something and actually doing it were two very different things.

Turning to face the SeeD captain, Shiva brought her blade to a ready position.

Squall made the first move, a series of thrusts that were meant to take advantage of the weapons firing capability rather than actually stab the opponent. Shiva parried a few and moved backwards to avoid the rest.

"Only give ground if you have to," Squall said parrying one of Shiva's strikes and countering, "Or you may find your back against something that won't give."

At that exact moment, Shiva's back hit a tree at the edge of the clearing. Seeing Squall close in on her, she moved forward, attacking viciously with several slashes. Squall dodged and rapped her on the wrist with the flat of his blade but allowed her to move back into the clearing.

"Always be aware of your environment," he continued, guarding against her attacks easily, "Even a seemingly open plain can be hazardous." With a push, he sent Shiva backwards into a small pothole. It wasn't enough to make her trip but she did stumble.

Squall didn't press the attack and waited for her to recover. When she regained her balance, he renewed his assault.

"Finally, and most importantly," Squall locked swords with Shiva, putting his strength against hers, "Always be alert for dirty play."

Before Shiva could respond, Squall had dropped his gunblade, causing Shiva to stumble forward. Quickly, he grabbed her wrist and spun her around, pressing her own blade against her throat.

"Dirty play huh?" asked Shiva mischievously. Warning bells began going off in Squall's head but before he could react Shiva turned around suddenly and kissed him full on the lips.

It was…warmer than he expected. A faint chill began to crawl from his lips to the rest of his body. He felt a surge of energy travel through him, making him feel cool, but at the same time his veins seemed to catch fire. It was unlike anything he had ever experienced before.

He was brought back to reality quite abruptly when he felt Shiva's ice blade press against his throat.

"You know, I think I could get to like this sparring thing," said Shiva smugly, her eyes mirthful.

'_So could I,' _said Squall's mind treacherously. Out loud he said, "Alright, I think you've had enough for today."

"Oh I don't know." Squall could hear the playfulness in her voice as she moved around behind him. "I kinda like having you at my mercy." The last words were whispered in his ear, her body pressed up against his back.

Squall wasn't a stranger to arousal. It was a required course at Balamb garden after all and Rinoa, despite being an emotional maelstrom, was still a good looking girl, but she was nothing compared to the level Shiva had him at.

Suddenly, Squall's hand shot up and caught the flat of the blade. Concentrating his inner magic, Squall brought the hottest fire he could manage to his hand and turned a portion of the blade into water. As soon as the blade was broken, Squall grabbed a stunned Shiva and flipped her over his shoulder and onto her back.

"I think you've had enough for today," said Squall once more as he smirked down at her prone form.

"Insufferable arrogant son of a…" Her mutterings trailed off as Squall went to retrieve his gunblade where it had fallen earlier.

"Is it my turn now?" asked Siren, getting up from the log she had been sitting on.

Squall nodded as he turned to face his new sparring partner. "What kind of weapon do you use?"

Siren raised her hand and light gathered around it. With a bright flash that illuminated the clearing, the light faded and Siren was holding a golden harp in her hand.

The SeeD raised an eyebrow.

"Believe it or not Mr. Muscle," said Siren, lightly strumming the strings, "Not every battle needs to be won with swords." With that, she plucked the highest string on her harp.

The sounds of wildlife seemed to fade out of the background. Squall's body tensed in anticipation, as if he were about to jump from a cliff face into the sea. Then, she moved her hand over the harp.

It sounded...divine. Otherworldly. Magical. Captivating. The SeeD could feel a pleasant tingle sweep through his body as his ears strained to catch every note. His senses seemed to dampen as every fiber of his being concentrated on the beautiful tune.

Then, the logic of the situation hit him like a freight train. The song was a true siren song that Squall had read about in the Greek myths of legend, something that entrapped men and made them oblivious to all else. Desperately he tried to tune the song out and force his limbs into motion but it was like trying to push through wet cement.

In the back of his mind, he noticed that Siren was moving towards him, still playing her enchanting, yet deadly, melody. He tried reaching for his magic but even his mental concentration seemed to be lacking.

Suddenly, Siren was standing in front of him. He had been so focused on breaking her spell that he hadn't even realized how far she had moved.

Then…she kissed him.

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SPLASH!

Squall awoke suddenly to the feel of near-freezing water.

"You know Siren, I'm a bit surprised he lasted that long. Usually you don't have to kiss someone to knock them out."

"He's a tough one. I tried to get him to walk towards me but his aura kept fighting my commands."

"Yeah but I still got caught by it," interjected the prone SeeD warrior, rising to his feet.

Siren smirked, catching Squall as he wobbled on his feet a bit. "The day I fail to make a man fall to my song is the day I put in for retirement as a GF. You didn't even get aroused; I must be loosing my touch."

Squall fought down the feeling of awkwardness. "It was a battle situation," he explained, "I was completely focused on breaking your spell to the exclusion of all else."

Siren pouted prettily. "Yeah but Shiva still got you going."

"Yeah…well…that was different."

The SeeD warrior nearly jumped in shock when he felt Siren's body press against his back. "Oh really? How so?" she whispered in his ear, her breath sending shivers down his spine.

Shiva blinked. One second Siren was hugging Squall from behind and the next second he was ten feet away, cleaning the dirt off his gunblade and replacing it in its sheath. "You know, I think that's enough training for one day."

Shiva and Siren shared a smirk.

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The rest of the day seemed to pass in a blur. Squall's other friends dropped by every now and again while he continued working through his stack of papers. Rinoa seemed to trying (and failing) to constantly dog his steps in the hopes of finding the "mystery girl" that Squall was with.

Cid called in a recovery team to standby outside the fire cavern in case they needed immediate medical attention when (or if) they finished their fight, under the guise of SeeD exam purposes.

All to soon, they were standing at the threshold of the Fire Cavern.

"It's gotten hotter since the last time I've been here," said Squall as he stood in front of the entrance.

"Probably thanks to Ifrit's demon avatar. I can sense his spirit in there," said Shiva who was standing beside him.

"How long do you think we'll be able to last in that heat?" asked Wedge who was shouldering one of Squall's old gunblades.

"No more than three minutes without Shiva's help. Can you do anything about this?"

"Not much," she admitted, "This place is an active volcano. Demon Ifrit is drawing on its power to supplement his own. It's too much for me to handle. I could at least keep the air temperature around us low but we'd have to stick pretty close together."

"How long can you hold it?"

"A couple hours, probably less if I have to fight."

"Considering our enemy, that's pretty much a given," cut in Wedge. "You're his weakness, he'll probably be targeting you most of all."

"So we've got about half an hour to beat this punk? Sounds fine to me," said Zell, punching his fist into his hand. "When I was taking my SeeD test I was able to clear this cavern in ten minutes flat."

"Then lets hope that Ifrit hasn't been doing some re-modeling while we were on our first quest to save the world," said Squall icily. Unsheathing his gunblade, the SeeD commander led the way into the fire cavern.

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A/N: I have no excuse but I do have one hell of a story. PM me or say so in a signed review if you want to hear it.


	9. Chapter 9

A/N: No I don't know why I'm updating this story more than my other ones. I guess I'm just a little more inspired for this right now.

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Not for the first time, Squall wondered why on earth he had decided to wear a heavy fur coat when he knew he was going into a volcanic sauna. Shiva was practically shoulder to shoulder with him and he could still feel the effects of the heat.

The fire around them seemed a lot more active, occasionally spurting up in brief firespouts before lying dormant. Underneath the sound of their own footsteps, a slow rumbling could be heard throughout the cavern.

"The fiends seem strangely absent," said Wedge aloud after a few minutes of walking.

"Maybe they're scared," put in Zell, punching the air a couple times.

"Maybe they know something we don't. Stay on your guard."

Occasionally, they would come to a place in the path that had been overrun by the lava. When this happened, Shiva froze the ground so they could carefully cross over. As they moved deeper into the fire cavern, the path became narrower as the molten rock closed in.

"Something's wrong with this lava," said Siren suddenly, bringing the party to an abrupt halt.

"What is it?" It looked like regular lava to him.

"This place is on a downward slope going in that direction," said Siren pointing towards the entrance, "But this lava is flowing that way." She pointed in the opposite direction.

Squall took a closer look. "You're right, it's flowing," he paused while he looked for the source, "That way."

"He's gathering power," cut in Shiva. "Squall, we need to hurry. If this monster absorbs the full power of this volcano, nothing short of deep freezing him in the arctic is going to stop him."

"Well, that's why you're here," he said amusedly.

"I'm flattered Squall, but I'm a guardian, not a god."

A sudden rumble brought their conversation to a halt. The guardians and the humans formed a circle, drawing their weapons and readying their magic. For a few seconds, no one moved.

"False alarm?" asked Zell after a few more seconds.

His answer came in the form of several plumes of lava erupting all around them.

"Run for it!" shouted Squall, pushing Shiva ahead of him. Behind them, the ground started falling away, and the lava slowly creeped towards them.

"Head towards that cliff!" shouted Zell, quickly sprinting to the head of the group. With a leap, Zell grabbed on to the cliff face and scrambled up like a demented spider, Squall hot on his heals. When they got to the top, Squall reached down and pulled up Shiva and Siren up by one hand, while Zell helped Wedge to the top.

No sooner had Siren's foot touched the ground than a huge plume of lava erupted behind her, singing her heel.

"It seems that we were expected," said Squall in his usual monotone. The path they had followed in was essentially gone; all that remained was a gigantic pool of lava.

"And it doesn't seem they're done yet!" said Zell, suddenly on his feet. Around them the lava had begun to stir again, but this time instead of plumes, they released bombs. Squall reached for his gunblade but the fist fighter was already in action, darting around the cliff, punching the bombs back from their area of safety.

Zell may have been hot tempered and bull headed but above all else, he was an accomplished fist fighter. He had lined his gloves and boots with ice magic, giving a nasty hit to any bomb that approached their cliff. He was even beginning to knock the bombs into one another, causing them to explode on contact.

"What do we do now?" shouted Wedge over the deafening explosions.

"Go through that wall!" yelled Shiva, pointing to the rock face behind them. "Ifrit's behind there!"

Squall got to his feet. "Stand back."

Concentrating his battle aura, Squall let it flow into his gunblade. The weapon accepted his aura easily, absorbing it like a sponge. Then, in a samurai like fashion, Squall drew the blade and made four slashes in the cliff face, his aura parting the rocks easily. Shiva, Siren, and Wdge immediately ran through.

"Zell, come on!"

"We can't let these bombs follow us," replied Zell, not missing a beat in his furious game of dodge-bomb. "I'll stay here and guard our exit. Hurry up and kill that thing!"

Squall didn't even look back as he ran after the rest of the party. It was useless trying to persuade him otherwise. One of the perks of being as stubborn as Zell was that people eventually just stopped arguing with you. Not to mention, Zell was right. It would be incredibly hard to battle Ifrit with bombs flying around.

The new path that Squall had opened up led into a small passageway, with a harsh orange glow at the end of it.

"That's him!" shouted Shiva over the noise behind her. "Run for it!"

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There was no fanfare, monologues, or posturing. One minute the circular room at the center of the volcano was quiet, and in the next, there were two humans and two Guardians viciously attacking the spot that Ifrit was standing, gathering power from the volcano.

The first barrage of ice and silence attacks hit him dead on, sending him hurtling into a wall, causing several rocks to fall on top of him.

Silence reined in the room for a few moments.

"Did we get it?" asked Wedge hopefully.

A loud roar sounded from the pile of rocks. With a mighty slash, Ifrit threw the rocks off of him, flinging several towards the party who separated to dodge.

"**That was a cheep shot sister."**

His voice seemed to shake the very earth. The volcano also seemed to match his tone as it rumbled warningly. Finally, he threw the last of the rocks off of him and Squall got his first look at Ifrit.

The first thing he noticed was that his skin was gone. His skeleton was showing, with dark flames licking at the blackened bones. Instead of his usual orange and red fire, he was surrounded by blue and black flames. He was crouched over on all fours, a sharp contrast to the lordly upright pose Squall was used to.

"**I knew once Shiva was awakened that someone would eventually be coming for me. I still find it incredible that you were so easily tricked into coming though."**

Squall raised an eyebrow. "So if this was to be a trap, why didn't you just take us out before we got here?"

"**Because with your release confirmed, Omega's time has now come! Your world is doomed! Bow before the almighty power of-"**

Siren's ball of silence detonated against his head with a soundless boom, abruptly cutting off his speech.

"I see your brother still hasn't lost his taste for monologue," said Siren casually.

Shiva sighed. "You said it cuz."

"**FOOLS! Your powers are useless here! This is my home, and now it will be your tomb!"**

With a mighty roar that echoed against the walls of the cave, the ground began to crumble away, revealing the lava underneath it. The seemingly solid rocks they were standing on were quickly melting into the magma beneath it.

"Shiva! Freeze the ground! Now!"

The ice guardian gave a quick nod before folding her hands and closing her eyes in concentration. Gradually, a thin film of ice covered the ground, halting the flow of lava. Granted, fighting on a slippery ground wasn't ideal, but it was better than a burning one.

Throwing off his coat, Squall ran towards Ifrit, hoping to distract him from Shiva's meditations. Simultaneously, Wedge approached his other side, thinking similar thoughts.

Ifrit's "heart" was visible behind his skeleton but as Squall quickly found out, the fire guardian's bones were as tough as steel. The SeeD quickly retreated before Ifrit could score a hit with his claws, instead causing him to deeply gouge the ice.

Seeing Squall's failed attempt at hacking through the ribs, Wedge began aiming for the head, hoping to cripple him somehow. Ifrit seemed to take offense to this though and parried with his claws, which also seemed to share the same toughness of his bones.

The two humans began darting around the fire guardian like flies, getting a hit in wherever they could while Siren put in a blast whenever she could. Despite the slippery ground, Wedge and Squall managed to avoid serious injury.

Finally, Squall landed a vicious cut on Ifrit's hand, causing him to roar out in pain. With a mighty leap, the guardian leaped to the other side of the room, well out of range of the gunblade users.

Gathering his power, Ifrit began launching his trademark meteor shots at them, forcing them to quickly dodge. It was only through serendipity that none of them came near Shiva.

Unfortunately, due to the slick ground, their forward progress was all but halted. Every time they tried to close in, they'd end up having to franticly dodge another meteor barrage. Siren also couldn't seem to get a shot off, because while she only required about four seconds to form and shoot a silence blast of considerable power, Ifrit was shooting about one blast every two seconds.

"Squall! Use your gunblade!"

The SeeD looked at Wedge confused. Did he want him to throw it?

As if in answer to his question, Wedge took the gunblade Squall had lent him and pressed a hidden switch in the pommel of the blade. Suddenly the blade detached, leaving him with just the gun.

"The hell?" Squall dodged another fireball before taking a precious few moments to examine the pommel of his gunblade. On the bottom, nearly invisible to the human eye, was a small hole.

"Get something long and thin to put in it!" shouted Wedge who was now returning fire in between dodging fireballs. The bullets only seemed to have minimal effect on the beast though.

Searching around quickly, Squall immediately spotted a thin sliver of ice, possibly broken off from the ground where Ifrit's claws had impacted it. Rolling to avoid another magma blast, Squall snatched up the sliver of ice and jammed it into the whole. There was a loud click, and the blade suddenly fell away.

A sudden jolt traveled through Squall's body as the gun in his hand suddenly synchronized with his ki. He had been taught before that a weapon was nothing more than an extension of your body but this gun actually _felt _like part of his body. Taking aim at Ifrit, he fired.

Instead of the expected bullets, the gun released his ki instead. A bright blue light streaked towards Ifrit just below the speed of sound before impacting his skeleton, causing him to stumble back a bit. Seeing the stumble, Squall continued firing alongside Wedge and Siren.

The fight staggered on a like a demented game of dodgeball with projectiles flying all over the room. Even Shiva had to momentarily break her concentration a couple times to dodge some projectiles. The tide was slowly turning in the SeeD's favor though. Although Ifrit's fireballs were big and powerful, they were still relatively easy to dodge, even on the slick floor, and the small hits they scored were slowly but surely wearing him down.

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'_Damn' _thought Zell as he furiously beat back another wave of attackers, _'Just how many dead bodies are in this lava?'_

At first, defending the ledge had been almost pathetically easy. Bombs had been trying to attack him from all sides but their assaults were poorly coordinated and easily thwarted. Even when the fire bats had joined the fray, things were still fairly manageable.

It was the fiery undead skeletons that were pushing his limits.

Granted, they weren't the most skilled fighters but they knew how to swing a sword, or bone, or rock, or whatever they could get their hands on really. While bombs and bats were easy to predict and intercept, the skeletons had just enough variation in their attack patterns to make things rather difficult.

A detached part of his mind wondered briefly how on earth bones, or metal swords for that matter, could survive the intense heat of the lava below him, but unfortunately the scientific impossibility didn't stop them from crawling out of the lava and up the cliff face three at a time.

He had briefly considered retreating into the tunnel Squall had gone down to force his enemies to come at him from one direction, but the idea was quickly rejected. The tunnel was Squall's only way out. A cave in triggered by fighting in it would spell certain death for all of them.

Zell dodged a blow from a bone club before shattering his attacker's skull and pushing him back into the lava. He'd probably just climb up the cliff again, even without his head, but it would give him a few moments reprieve.

'_Whatever the hell you're fighting in there Squall, hurry up and kill it!'_

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'_This…is not working.' _Ifrit finally conceded after one of the ki bullets narrowly missed his eye socket. Originally, his plan had been to corral them into the center of the volcano and destroy them instantly with his lava trap but Shiva had been able to keep the ground frozen much longer than he expected. Apparently, even though she was unaware of it, she had been drawing on Squall and Siren's stores of energy.

With a roar, Ifrit smashed the ground as hard as he could, sending ice shards flying everywhere. Some embedded in his skeleton but he shook the pain off, continuing to pound the ground. Finally, a satisfying crunch of ice gave way to the magma underneath. A few more hits and the hole was wide enough to fit him. With a leap, he submerged himself in the lava.

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The sudden lull in the fighting was a bit disorienting, Squall noted as he quickly reattached his gunblade. Shiva was still in a meditative posture, her entire concentration on maintaining the ice against the fury of the volcano.

"Where'd he go?" asked Wedge, reattaching the blade to his gun.

"Siren! Give me a location!"

The GF of silence nodded before closing her eyes and concentrating. Half a second later, they were open again.

"Shiva! Look out!"

The ice GF looked up briefly from her meditation, but the warning came a second too late. With a mighty crash, Ifrit erupted from the ice right underneath her. Turning in midair, Ifrit grabbed her around the middle and threw her down towards the ice, sending a meteor shot after her fall.

The resulting force created spider web cracks on the ice through the whole arena. The GF's body was nowhere to be seen.

"Shiva!"

Squall began sprinting over to the crater where Shiva had impacted, but was stopped with a sudden mental message.

'_I'm okay Squall, I'm just…out of…energy. I'll need about a day…to recharge…before I can manifest…again. Can't…keep…talking…" _The connection was abruptly cut off.

On one hand, he was relieved that Shiva was okay, but on the other hand, with her absence, the ground was starting to steam up in a clear sign of melting ice.

"_Squall, use your own power. Shiva should have the memory of how to do it."_

Quickly searching her recent memories, Squall found the pattern Shiva had been using to weave her ice and thrust his own energy into it. Immediately, the pattern latched onto his power like a leech.

'_At this rate I'll last about another three minutes. Maybe less if I have to keep fighting like this.'_

Readying his gunblade, Squall ran over to where Wedge had once again engaged Ifrit in close combat. His movements were slightly sluggish, like a computer with a second or two of delay after each command imputed. By himself, he probably would have already been toasted, but with Wedge running interference, they were able to keep Ifrit on the defensive. Siren had also procured her own weapon, and was also starting to move in close to engage.

Even though he wasn't making any attacks though, all Ifrit had to do was wait for the ice to melt, then it would be game over.

"LOOK OUT!"

**CRASH!**

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Zell wiped the sweat off his brow as the last skeleton shattered under the combined pressure of ice and fist. While the monsters were numerous, they weren't infinite, and the fire cavern seemed to have used up all of its ammo.

"I need to get to Squall," he muttered to himself, trying to catch his second wind. He needed to hurry, but he also knew that it'd be useless if he ran to the "big" fight in his current condition.

A minute passed, and then two. Slowly, Zell stood up, nursing some bruises and stretching some muscles.

A sound which could only be described as a scream rang throughout the cavern, immediately turning Zell from relaxed to full alert in an instant. Beneath him, the lava began to bubble and erupt. Another scream echoed off the cavern walls, shaking Zell's bones.

With a final plume of lava, the cavern revealed its final monstrosity. The flaming skeleton of a gigantic T-Rexaur.

"Oh fuck this."

Zell had fought the good fight and had weathered the fire cavern's assault but he wasn't going to stick around and see its deathblow. As he ran through the makeshift tunnel towards Squall, he could feel the heat of the skeletonized T-Rexaur behind him as it caved in the passage in his wake.

Spotting the opening ahead, the fist fighter put on a burst of speed and leapt into the clearing a hairs breadth ahead of the monster behind him

"LOOK OUT!"

**CRASH!**

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If the situation hadn't previously been so grim, Squall probably would have laughed (if he was in the habit of laughing that is). When Zell had made his dramatic entrance with the T-Rexaur hot on his heels, bouncing off of Ifrit's head in the fall from the opening, he had given them the perfect distraction needed to cripple the corrupted guardian via cutting off his skeletonized hand at the weaker joint.

But it hadn't ended there.

The T-Rexaur who had previously been running on solid ground suddenly found himself trying, and failing, to run on air. With no choice but to obey gravity, he had gone straight down and fell…straight on Ifrit. The force of the impact had partially broken through the ice, but had quickly re-frozen, further confining the corrupted Guardian Force. Burried under a pile of bone and frozen in ice with only one claw available, the fire guardian wasn't going anywhere.

Taking a firm grip on his gunblade, Squall half walked half staggered over to Ifrit's prison along with Wedge and Siren. Ifrit attempted to make a half-hearted swipe but was quickly stopped by the ex-Galbadia soldier, his appendage pinned to the ice via Wedge's gunblade.

"**He knows. Omega Weapon knows, and he's coming for you." **The Guardian grinned, **"And then you're all going to die!"**

"Hopefully by then you'll be playing for the right team," said Squall, fierce determination in his eyes. Without further ceremony, he embedded his ice enchanted gunblade into the corrupted Guardian's core.

If it hadn't been for Shiva's protection, Squall probably would have been roasted alive from the backlash of power Ifrit's core released. As it was, the heat wave still knocked him on his back.

Wedge and Siren immediately darted forward, grabbing their commander's arms and dragging him away from the hurricane of fire that was rapidly growing. With a final bang and a wave of heat that knocked everyone off their feet, Ifrit emerged.

"**It's about time you came and freed me, sister. I was beginning to think that you'd forgotten about me."**

Even when he wasn't in dark mode, Ifrit still spoke with a voice that commanded attention and respect. His booming tone echoed off of the cavern walls and the steady rumbling of the fire cavern added to his commanding presence.

"You're welcome bro," said Siren quickly, "But we need an exit, and fast!"

"**Very well. I suppose the pleasantries can wait."**

With a roar, Ifrit manifested a meteor shot before pounding it into the mountainside, blowing the collapsed rock away from the tunnel.

"**Leader Squall."**

Squall staggered to his feet, meeting Ifrit's eyes.

"**I will fly us out of here, but you must shield them with your ice magic while I do so."**

The SeeD nodded in affirmation before closing his eyes and concentrating. A faint blue Aura appeared around him, Wedge, and Zell.

"It will be easier for us if you return to your astral form," said Squall. Siren nodded before disappearing in a flash of light. The three fighters climbed onto the Guardian's back. The heat was mildly annoying but Squall's ice aura was making it bearable. Beneath him the makeshift ice ground was beginning to crack and melt into the rising lava.

"**Hang on little ones!"**

"To what?" Shouted Zell frantically, but Ifrit had already taken off.

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"You know I have to admit," said Cid to Squall as the medical team patched up his wounds. "You may not be much for grace or subtlety but you certainly have style."

On the outside, it had seemed like one minute everything was quiet and peaceful, and then in the next minute, the volcano was erupting and Balamb's commander was riding a demon out of the fiery depths of hell itself.

Needless to say, Ifrit's sudden appearance and flight path had nearly provoked an armed response. If it hadn't been for the lookouts spotting Squall on its back, things probably would have gotten real hot real quick.

Ifrit had dumped them in the center of the medical camp before disappearing in a flash of fire. Squall couldn't sense him in his mind directly but he could still feel his presence.

Surprisingly, none of them were seriously injured, aside from Shiva who was still unconscious. Zell had several small burns that needed to be attended, Wedge was also nursing his share of burns and bruises and Squall was suffering from severe ki depletion, but that was to be expected after the strain of holding the icy floor for so long. His consciousness was probably only going to last as long as the adrenaline in his body did.

'_Or at least until I stop feeding you healing energy,' _Put in Siren.

Squall grimaced. He was probably going to be out for a while.

'_Nonsense. With my help you'll probably only have to sleep for a day or two at most. It does give me some time to search through all your embarrassing memories though.'_

The SeeD commander was quickly starting to realize just how pointless it was trying to hide thoughts from someone who could read your mind. Trying _not _to think about something only made you think of it more and…

'_Oh my Squall, I never knew you were into p-"_

Cid's eyes widened in surprise as Squall suddenly hit himself on the side of his head. "Um, are you okay?"

"Just peachy."

'_You know, that doesn't hurt me at all.'_

'_Just shut up.'_

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"**Your mind is small human, but compared to my former prison, I suppose anything would be more agreeable."**

Zell jumped at the voice in his head, causing the medic treating his wounds to scold him.

"Where are you?" asked Zell, slightly confused.

"I'm standing right in front of you," said the medic. "And if you want me to treat these burns then stay still!"

"**Foolish human. Do you wish people to think you are crazy? Talk with your mind, not your mouth."**

"How am I supposed to do that?"

"By sitting still and shutting up," said the irritated medic. "Now let me treat those."

Zell turned as if just noticing the medic for the first time. "Um, actually they're not that bad. You can go help someone else."

"**I should hope that my container on Gaia would be a little fire resistant." **Said the voice smugly.

Zell looked at the burns on his skin curiously. They were fading right before his eyes, he couldn't even feel the sting anymore. Finally, his mind put two and two together.

"Wait a sec…you're Ifrit right?"

"**Took you long enough. Yes, I am Ifrit, the true Guardian of Fire."**

"Oh." There was a moment's pause. "So…why are you in my head and not in Squalls?"

"**I still hold a connection with our leader, but you hold my consciousness. I determined that it would be best for Squall if he did not have to contest with three separate consciences. Such a thing might prove to be too mentally taxing for a human."**

Zell snickered. "More like you don't want to be that close to your sister 24/7. It'd probably drive Squall insane."

"…**Nevertheless, I hereby charge you with holding my conscious, with holding my bond to this world. Take care you do not "screw it up" as you humans would say."**

The fist fighter sweatdropped. "You're a real great motivational speaker you know that?"

"**You try speaking after hundreds of years of solitude."**

"That does sound kinda hard."

"**Humph."**

"…So what was it like in eternal solitude?"

"**Boring."**

"That's it? Boring?"

"**What do you want from me, a haiku? I was completely alone in a grey, empty, prison. It was really REALLY boring. And you really should stop talking out loud. People are starting to stare."**

Zell briefly looked around at the medics who were starting at him with raised brows.

"It's okay," he reassured. "I'm just talking to the voices in my head."

Ifrit mentally slapped his forehead in frustration. 'It's still better than eternal solitude,' he repeated to himself like a mantra.

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-Squall's Mindscape-

"So, Ifrit is going to be staying in Zell's mind?" asked Squall, sitting comfortably on one of the chairs in his "reading room" mindscape. "I give him three days before he tries coming over here."

"That would be rather difficult I'm afraid. The human conscious of a single man is usually too small to even bond with one guardian, let alone two. You and your friends are the exceptions since you've been holding Guardians in your mind for about three years now."

Siren continued. "If you trained yourself, you could probably handle three, perhaps even four, but four would be your absolute limit. Any more and your body would probably explode, or some nasty equivalent."

Squall sighed. "If you guys knew that I would eventually need to recruit help to hold all of the guardians, why did I need to keep this from my friends?"

"We needed time to determine which of your friends we could trust."

That perturbed him a bit. "I can vouch for them."

"But we can't," replied Siren, steadfast. "And as much as you would like to trust them, we are completely clueless as to who the enemies real agents are. As we speak Ifrit is sifting through Zell's memories, making sure that he can be trusted with our secret."

"That seems a little extreme."

"Nevertheless. The Omega Weapon has spies everywhere, put in place long before even you were born. Anyone, including your friends, could be an agent."

"What about Cid then? Why didn't you go through his memories?"

"We did. We also went through Wedge's as well."

"How?"

"A Guardian ability. If any of them had a trace of Omega Weapon in them, we would have eliminated them immediately."

Squall sighed. "Look, can you just- I dunno, perhaps give me a heads up before you go off killing someone please?"

"What if one of the agents were one of your friends? What then? Would you really have the courage to fight against them? Would you really be able to eliminate them for the good of the world?"

Squall didn't respond, but Siren didn't seem like she was expecting one.

"Our mission comes first Squall, before anything. Failure to send Omega Weapon back to the void means there won't be _any _of your friends left, regardless of whom we have to eliminate."

"And failure to adhere to my one simple request of one god damn minor forewarning means that this quest might stop right here and now!"

A silence fell over Squall's mindscape as the shout echoed around the room.

"You'd forsake the entire world for your friends wouldn't you?"

"I did once, I'd probably do it again."

Siren was silent for a whole minute this time. "Alright Squall, you win. We'll tell you who the agents are before we take action. But you, in return, have to help in neutralizing them. Agreed?"

"Agreed. And Siren?"

The Guardian of Silence looked up.

"If it's any reassurance, I don't want the world to be destroyed either."

Siren laughed. "And if it's any reassurance to you, I don't exactly like the fact we may have to the eliminate some of the very people we were created to protect."

Squall held out his hand. "Still friends?"

"Of course." Siren took his hand, but took it one step further, pulling him into a hug. "For the time being," she whispered teasingly into his ear.

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A/N: At five thousand words, this is the longest GF chapter to date. I honestly couldn't think of a better stopping point than this one right here. Man I'm good! And yes, many of you may think that Chapter 7 was pointless with the card games and all, but it will serve a purpose later!

Reviews are appreciated but not necessary. Any questions you have I can answer as long as you leave a signed review or provide an e-mail address. I'll try to respond to all my reviews, as they are really the only thing I'm getting from writing this (aside from self-satisfaction of course).

Last but not least, I have a poll going on in my profile. If it's not too much trouble, stop by and vote. The poll will most likely have an impact to future updates.

And now, it's Omake Time:

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**The Guardian Room**

Squall looked around confused at the room in his mindscape. Instead of his regular comfy chairs and fireplace, it appeared to be the interior of a fancy car. At one end sat Shiva and Ifrit, the latter with his hands folded in front of his face.

"**Welcome, to the velvet room."**

"Huh?"

"**Do not be alarmed, you are fast asleep in the real world."**

Squall sweatdropped. "Have you guys been getting into my Persona memories again?"

"**Do you believe in destiny?"**

"Ugh, not again."

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	10. Chapter 10

A/N:

_1 Year ago..._

Squall eyed the guard to Caraway's mansion with disdain. "Are you serious? We're trying to plot the assassination of one of the worlds most powerful political leaders, where time is of the essence, and you want us to find the ID number of a god damn student stupid enough to go grave digging?"

"Hey look pal," the guard said, annoyance on his face. "My orders came from general Caraway himself. He told me, to tell you, that you need to go to the Tomb of the Unknown King and find the missing student's ID number."

The mercenary looked around briefly at the relatively empty streets. "You know I could shoot you right now and I don't think many people would care." The guard backpedaled slowly as Squall stepped nearer.

"Woah Squall, take it easy man," said Zell suddenly, putting a hand on his leader's shoulder, only to quickly remove it at the glare he received. "Right, sorry, no touching. Seriously though, he's probably got fifty people just like him at his beck and call. We'd be killing them all day." The guard was shaking now as the small group continued discussing his death with casual ease.

With a visible effort, Squall calmed himself, letting his anger relax. "You!" He barked at the guard who reflexively stood at attention. "Stay right here. I'll be back." The guard nodded quickly.

Spying a pay phone in the vicinity, Squall walked over and inserted some Gil, punching in the number for Balamb garden. After a couple rings, the other end picked up. "Balamb Garden, how may I direct your call?"

"Squall Leonhart, code named Lion Heart. Identification number 289. Could you put me through to headmaster Cid please?"

"Certainly Mr. Leonhart. One moment please." A few chords of hold music followed.

"This is Cid. What can I help you with Squall?"

"Sorry to bother you headmaster, but I was wondering if you could do me a favor."

"If it's in my power to help, I will."

"There was a student who got himself killed in the Tomb of the Unknown King a while back. I was wondering if you could tell me his ID number."

"Sure thing. Any special reason you need to know this though?"

"Let's just say it'll make this mission go a lot faster."

All of Squall's party and Caroway's guard swetdropped as he hung up the phone a second later and walked back to the guard.

"The student's number is 175. Satisfied?" His eyes dared the man to say otherwise.

"I don't think that's quite what he-"

"SATISFIED?" An aura was beginning to become visible now.

"P-p-please. Go on in sir!"

_Present Time..._

Despite having fled from an erupting volcano on the back of a fire demon, Squall's group had emerged relatively unscathed. Zell had received the worst of it, having had to keep an entire legion of fiends at bay while the others had battled, but his new junction to Ifrit had ensured a swift recovery and increased heat resistence.

In the meantime, the volcano erupting on Balamb Island had caused a huge amount of paperwork. Forest fires had to be put out, huge clouds of ash were currently obscuring the sun, Balamb Garden needed a new SeeD examination course, and Cid had apparently found a lead.

"So what exactly is this?"

"It's a lamp," said Cid simply.

"I know it's a lamp. Why are you showing me this?" Asked Squall impatiently.

"It's something that I meant to give to you before you left for Timber but I accidentally misplaced it."

Squall sighed. "Look, unless it's going to produce a magic genie that we can use to wish this entire conflict away, I still don't see how this is going to help us."

"It's not a magic lamp," protested Cid, "It's a cursed magic lamp."

The SeeD shrugged. "So it's an evil genie then. Again, how does this help us?"

"I think there might be a guardian in here."

That perked Squall's interest. "How can you be sure?"

"I was digging through some old records on the guardians that were used here in the past before we started rotating Quetzacotl, Shiva and Ifrit," he explained, picking up a file on top of his desk. He handed it to Squall who began reading.

"It says there that at one point NORG was using a Guardian known as Diablos, but the first SeeD soldiers that tried to use it were violently rejected."

_'Yeah, Diablos always was kind of an asshole,"_ chimed in Siren.

_'Hey! Don't speak about him behind his back like that,"_ protested Shiva.

_'Hey, you were thinking it too.'_

"After the third SeeD was put into a coma," continued Cid, unaware of the mental conversation going on, "They confined him to a prison of some sort. There weren't any details provided, but we can probably assume that this lamp is the key."

Squall put the file down with a nod. "Diablos huh? Don't think I ever ran into his body on my travels. What do you two think?" The question was directed at Shiva and Siren.

"It's possible that his spirit and body remained whole throughout the imprisonment," said Siren, appearing in a bright flash next to Squall.

A mini ice tornado swept up on Squall's right, heralding the arrival of Shiva. "I agree. Unless the guardian allows it, there's no way a normal human could junction themselves to a complete guardian. Probably explains why it hurt the ones who tried."

Squall stared at the lamp intently. "So you're telling me that this lamp contains the devil, known for his hatred of human beings and traumatizing of the ones that tried to bond with him, correct?"

Shiva was silent for a minute. "Yeah, that about sums it up."

The SeeD tossed the lamp back onto the table. "I think I'll let this one sit a while."

Siren looked shocked. "Why?"

"Hey, he ain't going anywhere. Besides, we don't know anyone who could junction him successfully. Never mind that he's opposed to junctioning in the first place."

"Makes sense I suppose," said Shiva hesitantly. "Do we have any other leads?" This question was directed at Cid.

The headmaster sighed. "Not as many as I'd like. I've been digging through a lot of old documents lately that NORD had previously hidden from me. There are scattered reports of some sort of research center which was experimenting with powerful guardians, but the location was top secret. There's also a few reports of some Esthar labs running tests as well, but nothing solid."

Squall looked over the large world map spread out over the wall, tiny pins indicating where the located guardians had been found. "At least three of these guardians were stolen from our enemies during our trips. Edea briefly gave Carbuncle to Seifer before I beat him up and took it from him. Fuijin was using Pandemonium for a time before I beat him up, NORG was junctioned with Leviathan when I fought him, and Edea was using Alexander."

Cid nodded thoughtfully. "I don't know about Carbuncle, but Leviathan and Pandemonium have been here a long time. I can probably pull up the records on them and get a clue to their locations. Quetzacotl too now that I think about it. Edea would be more than happy to provide information about Carbuncle and Alexander as well."

"And if there really are only sixteen primary guardians to worry about, then that leaves seven unaccounted for," finished Squall. "Chances are that at least one GF will be at the Deep Sea Research Center, and with our luck it will be the most powerful one of the bunch."

Siren blinked. "Deep Sea? How did you come to that conclusion?"

Squall shrugged. "Simple. I've been all over the world on foot. If there was any place to hide a research center, it'd either be deep underground, or somewhere in the middle of the sea." Taking a pin from the board, he stuck it in the middle of the biggest ocean.

"Who do you think it is?" asked Shiva, peering over his shoulder.

"Bahamut," he said simply. "The most dangerous guardian known to man. They probably secluded the laboratory to make sure that the mainland wouldn't be affected if they lost control of them. Thoughtful of them really."

"It's a sound theory," provided Cid, "but I don't think we have the resources or time necessary to make an expedition to the middle of the sea based on a theory. Not to mention I don't like Balamb's chances against an irate imprisoned dragon."

Squall waved him off. "I'd rather fight Diablo naked then go after the king of dragons without sufficient backup. Besides, I can't even start looking for it until the Ragnarock is repaired."

Cid sat down, leaning back in his chair with a sigh. "So where does that leave us then?"

"I found Shiva in the middle of an ice storm near Shumi Village. Ifrit was in the middle of an active volcano. I can't be certain, but it seems to me that the guardian's spirits are drawn to wherever their element is strongest."

"What about me then?" asked Siren cutely.

"You don't have an element," dismissed Squall. "Finding you was just dumb luck."

"How rude." Squall nearly jumped as he felt a pair of warm arms wrap around his neck from behind. "Finding me is the best kind of luck," she purred in his ear, sending shivers down his spine, making him distinctly aware of her generous assets pressed into his back.

The mercenary tried to shrug of Siren's embrace, but the woman was stronger than she looked. Finally, Shiva came to his aid, grabbing her cousin in a headlock and prying her off the helpless SeeD. "Flirt with the pretty boy later cuz. We're doing important world saving business right now."

Siren pouted but relented. "You never let me have any fun."

Squall gave a light cough, trying to dismiss the scene as nothing relevant. "Anyways, if we assume that someone like Quetzacotl is drawn to electricity, it stands to reason he'd be in or around the technological epicenter of the world, Esthar."

"That's not exactly an easy trip for this garden either," said Cid cautiously.

Squall dismissed this comment too. "That's okay. I was thinking of something a bit closer to home." Picking up another pin, he stuck it squarely on the map.

"The tomb of the unknown king?" said Cid, puzzlement clear on his face. "Who were you planning on finding there?"

"The Brothers," said Squall, moving back to the front of Cid's desk. "About a year ago, Caroway tried to send me on a mission to find the ID of some stupid kid who got himself killed there. At the time, I was a little pissed off so I just called you to find the ID number and get access."

Cid remembered. That had been a rather odd phone call.

Squall rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "Of course, later I learned that he was trying to send me there to subdue a GF for my mission, but I didn't care at the time." He shook his head. "But that's not important now. The Brothers are of the element earth. The tomb is one of the last ancient catacombs still standing. It stands to reason that the Brothers would be drawn to an earthen tomb. We might not find the spirit there, but at least we can find the body."

Cid nodded thoughtfully. "And for a trip like that, you could just take the train from Balamb and not have to worry about moving the garden around. Sounds like you have everything worked out. Is there anything else you need me to do?"

"Just keep your ear to the ground and your eyes open. Any kind of geographical anomalies might be a sign of a guardian's spirit awakening," said Shiva before vanishing in a burst of mist.

"And be on the lookout for Omega's agents." Siren then disappeared in a flash of light.

"And I'm not paying for my own train ticket this time," Squall shot over his shoulder as he walked out of the office.

_Balmb Garden: Training Center_

"So how long were you imprisoned?" asked Zell curiosly, looking at the scaled down version of Ifrit.

"**That's a good question. What day is it today?"** Even when he wasn't in his gigantic demon form, his voice seemed incapable of being anything but deep and menacing.

"Uhh..." Zell thought for a minute. "Thursday."

"**Right. I've been imprisoned for about three millenniums," **he deduced.

"Sounds boring. How'd you entertain yourself?"

"**Slept mostly. Sung songs other times. Went insane for a few years. Regained it a few years later. Plotted a few hundred different ways to get revenge on those that wronged me. Pretty standard stuff really."**

"Zell. Ifrit." The two turned towards the new arrival and saw Squall walking towards them, gunblade over his shoulder.

"Hey man!" Zell waved him over. "Dude, these guardians are awesome! Have you tried sparring with one of them yet?"

Squall looked at Ifrit's human sized form. Two horns were atop his head, curving down behind his back, ending in vicious points. The red and yellow hair that covered his body seemed to flicker, as if they were made of flame. His entire body was heavily muscled, and his hands and feet were both adorned with sharp, lethal looking claws.

"You...sparred with him?" Squall asked incredulously.

"Of course!" Zell seemed genuinely shocked that he doubted his word. "He fights pretty well for someone who's been imprisoned for a few thousand years."

Ifrit turned to Squall, with something akin to a look of worry on his face. **"I think your friend might be insane, but he holds himself very well in a fight."**

Squall covered a smile. It was nice to see that even with a new crisis bubbling around them, Zell was still his usual energetic self. "We've acquired a new target," he said, slipping into commander mode. Instinctively, Zell stood a little straighter. Beside him, Ifrit payed him full attention.

"I won't go into details until we have the whole party assembled, but we're taking the train to Dollet city in two hours. Make sure to get something to eat before we leave. We're going to be pretty busy once we get there."

"Sure thing cap," said Zell happily. "I was getting a little bored of sitting around anyways. Come on Ifrit, allow me to show you the miracle of hot dogs."

Before he could run out of the training center, Squall halted him by grabbing his shoulder. "Zell, I don't think the rest of the garden is ready for a walking talking fire demon running through the halls of the garden. Secrecy remember?"

Zell rubbed the back of his head. "Right, sorry cap." Beside him, Ifrit vanished in a pillar of flames. "See you at the entrance in a couple hours."

_Teacher Dormitories: Wedge's Room_

"Enjoying your new quarters?"

Wedge looked up from his edition of Weapons Weekly to see the SeeD commander standing in the doorway of his new room. "The last three years I was in the army, I was bunking with Biggs in a room that was about as big as I am tall. You could have given me my own room in a broom closet and it still would have compared favorably to my old quarters in the Galbadian army."

Squall repressed a smirk. "I'll take that as a yes then. How are your injuries?"

Wedge rotated his shoulders experimentally. "Little sore, but completely healed thanks to Siren. I love the medical coverage this job gives."

"See any blades you like yet?" asked Squall, gesturing to the magazine.

"The Punishment blade looks pretty good, but you really can't beat a custom made gunblade like that one," he said, pointing to Squall's old blade leaning up against the wall in its sheath.

The SeeD shrugged. "Well, feel free to keep using it until we can customize one for you."

Wedge nodded slowly. "Alright then, now that we have pleasantries out of the way, what can I do for you?"

"We've got a potential guardian near Dollet."

Wedge sighed. "Man, that quickly? Which one is it?"

"The Brothers. Earth element."

Wedge pondered for a moment. "I don't know. Dollet is still pretty much a Galbadia controlled city. Might not be wise for me to show my face there."

Squall sighed. "Wedge, I don't think anyone knows what your face looks like."

"Huh?"

"Take a look at your profile," said Squall, handing him a folder. "Didn't they even bother asking you to take your helmet off for the photos they took?"

Wedge looked through the book and saw that it was true. Every picture in there had his face half covered by the standard helmet he'd always worn. Even his drivers license.

"Probably explains why Selphie was able to sneak into their nuclear missile silo so easily. It's hard to tell you guys apart sometimes."

"Alright," he conceded, "I'm in. But who is going to carry the Brothers? I thought Zell needed time to recover before he could attempt another true junction."

"You are," said Squall simply.

Wedge's brain took a second to process what he'd just heard. "I'm sorry, did you just say I was going to junction this one?"

"That's the idea. Chances are we're only going to find the shell of the guardian, but it'll help facilitate a true junction when we find the Brothers' spirit."

Wedge rubbed his head worriedly. "Squall, I've been here less than two days. Do you really think the headmaster is going to trust me with a GF that early?"

"The headmaster doesn't decide on things like this," countered Squall easily. "I'm commander of the garden. Who I decide to hire is my business and GF assignment is also my business. You've helped me kill two of these things now, and you weren't even junctioned. If that doesn't make you deserving, I don't know what does."

Wedge remained silent. Apparently trust hadn't a big commodity in Galbadia.

"I'll see you at the gate in a couple of hours."

Despite being the commander of Balamb's armed forces, Squall had made it a point to take his meals in the lunchroom along with everyone else. Cid had told him soon after he took command that it would make everyone feel easier around him if he ate with the 'troops' so to speak. As much as he disliked social interaction with nameless faceless people, he could see where the idea had its merits.

"Squallie!"

Of course, sitting out in the open lunch room also made him an easy target.

"Hello Selphie," said Squall evenly, trying to deafen his senses to the bright cheerful attitude permanently attached to her presence.

"I figured you'd be brooding in the back of the lunchroom."

"Quistis," he said evenly, returning to his ramen. "What can I help you with?"

"I don't suppose you'd consider that I only wanted to have lunch with an old student of mine?" she asked humorously.

Squall rolled his eyes. "You usually take lunch in your classroom to work over lesson plans and you," he continued, pointing at Selphie, "are still organizing the quad for the next graduation festival." Both woman had the grace to look sheepish. "So again, what can I help you with?"

Quistis took a seat in front of him. "Alright, you caught me. I came to ask you for the layout of the practical part of the examination. I need to know what to start preparing the students for."

"Hostage situations and stealth operations," he replied simply. "I've left the details with headmaster Cid, but we'll have a working exam in less than a week if all goes well." He glanced at Selphie, silently giving her permission to speak.

"Do you have a speech planned for the graduating students?" she asked hopefully. "They'll expect you to give one at the party afterwards."

"Not...yet," he replied cautiously.

"_They want you, the master of the ellipses to give a speech?"_ asked Shiva silently.

"_Oh I can just imagine that now. Congratulations on passing everyone....now you can go into the field and get shot for real...till next year everyone," _quipped Siren.

"Great! I already made a speech for you because I knew you wouldn't!"

Squall put up a hand, forestalling her explanation. "First of all, I refuse to recite any speech including the words 'love' 'joy' 'peace' 'happiness' 'excited' 'grateful' and-"

"I know, I know," assured Selphie, cutting him off. "Quistis already gave me the list of words you refuse to say in conversation and I cut them out."

"Did you include thesaurus entries for those words too?" he inquired.

"Yes, and before you ask I didn't use any double negatives either."

The commander sighed. "Fine, I'll take a look at it. Now what are you two really doing here?"

"We're just wondering why you aren't taking us along on with you on your super secret mission today."

Squall raised an eyebrow. "What makes you think I have a mission today?"

"Zell is bad at keeping secrets," said Selphie simply. "He was incredibly evasive when we tried to ask him for help in the quad, saying he had other things to do."

"You didn't use to keep secrets from us Squall."

The SeeD raised an eyebrow.

"Okay, maybe you did. But this is different. Why won't you let us help you?" Quistis nearly pleaded the last sentence.

"_Man, I think she has it for you pretty bad,"_ said Shiva.

"_Nah, it's a teacher-student relationship. Those never go anywhere," _countered Siren. _"He could probably get a wonderful night of wild passion if he wasn't such a p-"_

Squall slammed his mind shut, pulling the plug on their inner dialogue. He took a deep breath before daring to look at Quistis again.

"Professor," he addressed her formally. "I of all people know how well you can be trusted, but this is just one of those things I'm going to have to ask you to drop, as commander of Balamb's defense forces."

Quistis recoiled as if she had been struck. Squall had never pulled rank on her before.

"I trust you," he amended quickly, "but there are other things at play here, most of them bigger than me and my position."

The teacher's face was still sullen, but she nodded slowly in understanding. "I understand. But why does Wedge get to go with you then?"

"Dumb luck," he said simply. "He got caught up in the mess I was making and got dragged along for the ride. I'm just lucky he's being such a good sport about it."

"Hey!" broke in Selphie. "What about me?"

"I wouldn't trust you with the number combination to my briefcase," said Squall casually, leaning back in his chair.

The female SeeD pouted cutely. "Aww, that's mean."

Squall shrugged. "Selphie, the minute I talk to you, the entire garden will know the whole mission. These things are labeled 'secret' for a reason you know?"

"I can keep a secret," she said defiantly, a small fire in her eyes.

"Hey Selphie, what does Zell like to do in the training grounds after curfew?"

"Every Friday night he goes to the training room in only his boxers and some war paint so he can feel closer to nature as he fights the training room monsters bare-fisted," she rattled off instantly. As if realizing what she'd just said, she brought a hand to her mouth, her face in a look of surprise. "Oops. I was supposed to keep that a secret." Beside her, Quistis face-palmed.

Squall got up and patted her on the shoulder. "I'll be back in a few days. Don't worry too much."

*click*

"_Man, is she really the same age as you?"_ Inquired Siren, having broke through his mental block. _"Hard to believe. Probably why he hasn't done her yet. She could make a guy feel like a pe-"_

_*SLAM*_

_Train from Balamb to Delling..._

"Thanks to our contacts in the technological utopia of Esthar, we were able to pull up some old blueprints of our destination," said Squall to the assembled humans and guardians. "First off, I'd like to ask the guardians if they have any insight into our opponent."

"**Slow but powerful," **provided Ifrit. **"It may take them a while to warm up, but they can easily work up earth tearing tremors."**

"They heal themselves from the earth," said Shiva. "We'll have to find some way to lift them off the ground if we want to defeat them."

"Float magic should take care of that problem." Softly, he heard Wedge mumble something under his breath.

"What was that Wedge?" asked Squall patiently.

"I was just wondering if we really had to fight them underground," he said aloud after a seconds hesitation.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, when we fought Ifrit, he nearly brought a volcano down on our heads. If we walk in there like we did in the fire cavern, we'll just be playing into their hands again."

Squall nodded thoughtfully. "This is probably true, but we have little choice but to confront him down in his lair. We'll just have to adapt to any traps he may have set."

"What if we spring our own trap?" asked Zell suddenly.

The mercenary gave him a flat look. "Our own trap?"

"Yeah!" Zell was excited now. "What if, instead of him bringing the place down on us, we bring it down on him?"

"You mean," began Wedge hesitantly, "blow up the place before he can?"

"Exactly! That way we can fight on our terms on the surface, or we can crush him under the rubble."

Squall blinked and made a show of cleaning out his ear. "You know, something might be wrong with me, but I don't really think that's a bad idea."

"**Wake up the spirit, goad him into combat, then bring his home down around his ears. It seems to be a sturdy plan."**

"Well, we are destroying a hundreds of years old tomb filled with the mysteries of the old world," pointed out Squall. Meeting the flat looks of his party members, he gave a small shrug. "But hey, if they actually cared about him, they'd remember his name."

Turning towards Wedge, he began giving orders. "Soon as we get to Dollet, you'll be in charge of finding explosives. Get enough to level a small city if you can manage it without alerting the authorities. Zell, I want you to make sure we have enough refined float magic to lift Dollet off the ground if we wanted. I'm going to secure a hotel room to be our base of operations while we're in Delling. Don't draw attention to yourselves, don't start fights unless you won't get caught, and stay the hell away from Caroway's mansion. That's one headache I'd rather just avoid for now."

The train bell dinged, signaling their arrival at Delling city.

"Gentlemen, guardians, it's time to go kill us a king."

A/N: Here is a general outline of the current GF situation. The ones they don't know about aren't on this list yet.

Siren: Acquired (Body and soul)

Ifrit: Acquired (Body and soul)

Shiva: Acquired (Body and soul)

Diablos: Imprisoned (Body and soul)

Carbuncle: (Body acquired)

Leviathan: (Body acquired)

Pandemonia: (Body acquired)

Quetzacotl: (Body acquired)

Alexander: (Body acquired)

Brothers: (Location Known: Body un-acquired)


End file.
